Into Oblivion
by PippinStrange
Summary: A post-apocalyptic Earth leaves the Avengers scattered across the galaxy and a world in ruin. The defeat of Thanos on Asgard by Captain Marvel is now a legend. Just before graduating high school, Peter Parker finds something he never expected - an infinity stone. He'll do whatever it takes to destroy it before Thanos returns, and he'll need the Avengers and new allies to do it. AU.
1. Concerning Graduation

**...**

 **Prologue**

 **...**

* * *

 _Before creation itself, there were six singularities. When the universe exploded into existence, and the remnants of these systems were forged into concentrated ingots... six elemental crystals, hurtling across the virgin universe. These Infinity Stones each control an essential aspect of existence. Space, Reality, Power, Soul, Mind, and Time._

 _They were desired and coveted by the mad Titan, Thanos. The infinity stones were collected and sent to far corners of the galaxy where he could not use them against the innocent, to prevent the unification and destruction they could entail._

 _His lust for genocide, a misguided desire for balance, and his armies combined were finally terminated during a great battle on the planet Asgard, a final showdown between the mightiest heroes of the galaxy combining power and intellect._

 _The smartest of them strategized. The strongest met him on the battlefield, across the scoped and plunging falls of the bays outside Asgard's capital city. The war waged across every waterfall, balcony and bridge. His minions fell, hundreds by hundreds, until it was time to take on the Titan himself._

 _Captain Marvel was finally successful in bringing down the Titan, sacrificing herself to save the galaxy. Some Midgardians that were present; Agents of Shield and some of Earth's mightiest heroes, survived the conflict and returned to Earth._

 _Many of them would be present for another kind of annihilation; an invasion of Chitauri in 2012. The Avengers defended earth but not without great loss and consequence. While decimating the alien ships, a toxic gas was triggered that spread across the entire globe. There are few areas left untouched. Structures and domes are built in farming communities, greenhouses built to try and keep some semblance of flora, fauna, crop, insect life left alive. It's not fast enough._

 _While the gas is breathable because it does not kill instantly, it has long-lasting effects and is the number 1 cause of lung cancer. Breathing with a mask in public is now a requirement. Death tolls rise as impoverished groups are unable to purchase and/or maintain their gas-masks long term. Rural communities without reliable communications or modern technology cease to exist - death tolls rise by the hundreds. Thousands. Millions._

 _It won't be long before life on Earth ends completely, while the natural environment slowly suffers and dies, humans struggle to buy passage off-planet to begin anew elsewhere in the galaxy..._

 _..._

 _..._

* * *

 **...**

 **One - Concerning Graduation**

 **...**

* * *

 _..._

 _..._

 _Peter Parker_

...

...

I brace myself for the incoming fist.

For all the good my powers do, getting into an unprompted fight with a classmate is always a bad, bad idea. Pulling punches is hard enough. Pulling back on self defensive moves are even harder.

Flash Thompson punches me right below my oxygen mask, clocking me right in the hose and past that into my throat, and I exaggerate my fall a bit, bouncing off the brick wall and landing on the concrete. Anything to make it look like I'm a normal kid and not the web-slinging, wall-crawling, newest Avenger-initiate Spider-Man.

I turn over quickly before he can kick me, scrambling up and out of the way. There's a spray of blood inside my mask, making it harder to see.

"Come on, Parker!" Flash growls. "Bring it!"

"I didn't sabotage your application for getting off planet," I snap, holding my hands out defensively. "Whatever you may think. None of it's true."

"He's a fucking liar!" snarls one of Flash's friends, tag-teamed by two others. They have a certain prep-school bully look, sleeves rolled up, shirts untucked, ties loosened.

"Joining the decathlon team late in the semester like that bumped me out of the top spot," Flash goes on, tugging up at his sleeves angrily. "You _knew_ they were looking at those scores for the scholarships…"

"I wasn't trying to hurt you, or anyone," I protest. "I have my own way for getting off planet. You can _have_ my spot."

"He doesn't want handouts from a loser like you," one of the boys shouts. "You fucking brown-noser. If you're such a favorite, why doesn't one of the Avengers swoop in and save your pathetic ass right now? Huh?"

"It doesn't work that way," I sigh. "I'm just an _intern…"_

"Yeah, Just-Intern," Flash goads. "Interns don't get off planet. Interns get minimum wage jobs and die in the fog like the rest."

"Flash, I'm _serious._ My aunt and I already have tickets. We're leaving after graduation. I don't want to hurt your chances of going _anywhere._ I swear."

"Oh you got tickets, huh? Where'd you get them? Hawk them off an Avenger at that so-called internship? Pulling some strings with Tony Stark?"

"They were graduation gifts," I respond, making fists, feeling the veins in my arms pop and cord, rolling with the post-traumatic heat that always follows when I'm forced to bring him up. "From… my uncle."

"Oh really," Flash says in faux-confusion, "You mean the _dead_ one?"

The heat becomes lead, and I fly at him, knocking him backwards right into the cement. His head would have bounced painfully - and dangerously - if it weren't for his own mask. The other boys cheer lustily with surprise and approval, grabbing at my arms to pull me off of Flash. I get one small shove at his face, pushing it down into the asphalt, before I let them drag me off.

"STOP!" I hear Michelle Jones' voice scream before I see her. "Flash Thompson, you ignorant slut! Get _out!"_

I'm seeing red when I jerk my arms away from Flash's friends, hearing their laughter as they shove me back against the wall so that they can step out of the alleyway.

"Save me a taste of _that,"_ says one of them rudely, giving MJ a gross once over with roaming eyes.

"I'm calling the fucking cops, you neanderthal," MJ responds, leering right into his face.

Flash, to his credit, shoves his friend away from MJ, muttering " _Sorry,"_ like a petulant child. "Come on guys. Parker's not even worth it."

The three of them walk down the sidewalk, rude names echoing past their lips, disappearing deeper into the city.

"Yeah, and, and _stay away,"_ chimes in Ned, emerging from behind the wall of the alley.

"Dude, where were _you?"_ I exclaim.

"I stopped at the newstand a block ago," Ned held up a paper. The blaring headline was not difficult to miss.

 _ATMOSPHERE CONDITIONS WORSEN_

 _OFF PLANET RAFFLES HARDER TO COME BY?_

"You, my friend," Ned points at me, "You just kept walking. You didn't even notice."

"I'm sorry," I apologize.

"You okay?" MJ asks. She reaches up and tries to adjust my cockeyed mask on my face. "This looks… sorta broken."

"It's fine," I lie.

It's broken.

"No, shh, listen," MJ puts a hand on my chest to silence me. Suddenly all I can think about is her hand on my sternum and how it sends thrilling electrical jolts through my whole body…

There's a high pitched whistle in the air.

"You're leaking air!" MJ exclaims angrily, removing her hand. "There's a hole in this thing somewhere."

"Come on. Let's get back to your place." Ned suggests. "Aunt May is okay with us coming, right?"

"Yeah. She's been cooking all day."

"That's… not a good sign," Ned admits sheepishly.

"Let's go, let's go, the air ain't getting any cleaner," MJ waves us forward. The three of us make our way down the sidewalk southeast towards my Queens neighborhood.

I glance up at the sky visible between the old brick buildings. Well, if you can call it a sky. It's dark yellow, like mustard. The fog that was left after the Chitauri ships disintegrated in our atmosphere. When the Avengers saved us, but… just barely. And at the expense of the planet, which of course, they didn't know when they destructed the ships and the aliens within.

The yellow fog hangs over the skyscrapers of New York City, dismal, dark, like an old sunset barely seen through the smoke of a wildfire that occur in more natural parts of the world, with trees and dry brush susceptible to burn.

It's been six years since the world went to shit.

Six months since Uncle Ben died.

And it still feels like it happened yesterday.

When we reach our apartment complex, opening the front door is greeted by a bellowing plume of smoke. So much for wildfires being a thing I only read about…

"Aunt May!" I exclaim worriedly, diving through the living room and into the kitchen, grabbing the closest placemat off the table and waving it in all directions. I take my mask off and wave them both in criss-crossing motions across the room, pushing the smoke towards the exhaust fan above the stove.

"It's fine, it's fine! I already turned the fans on!" Aunt May is waving a potholder, an old-fashioned apron tied around her waist and her hair tossed into a messy bun. "It's really fine, I didn't even burn any _food._ I mean I did. But not food we're going to _eat._ Crumbs from last week's pie crust fell down into the bottom of the stove so when I turned it on they all burnt up. But the _food_ is fine."

MJ and Ned shyly stand in the living room. MJ has removed her mask, Ned has not.

"Oh, take your damn mask off, Ned," Aunt May laughs. " _This_ won't kill you. Unlike all that. Out there."

Ned hastily rips off his mask. "Yes ma'am."

"Hello, welcome," Aunt May says. "Welcome, Michelle. Is this, you're, uh, first time here?"

"No, I've been here before," MJ admits. "Just a few times over the years."

"Oh, sorry, my memory is terrible - when were you here last?" May persists.

"Uh… the reception," MJ replies slowly. She means the reception after the funeral for my uncle. "Oh. Um. And a few times for homework. Before that. Like sophomore year or something."

"Well, nice to see you again," Aunt May replies briskly, skimming over the subtle hint of Uncle Ben. It's unavoidable, and she's gotten way too good and bottling up reactions - saving them for later, usually, in an explosive meltdown - far away from me and hiding in her bedroom where she thinks I can't hear her.

I can. The walls are thin.

"So what's for dinner?" Ned asks cheerfully. "It smells really good."

"Parmesan chicken, baked potatoes, and…" Aunt May pauses, checking the microwave. "Broccoli. Frozen broccoli." She hits the timer for 5 minutes. "Which will soon not be frozen."

"How'd it go?" I ask. "Um. The chicken."

"Ah, well," Aunt May laughs uncomfortably. "I got a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store because… yeah. I wasn't going to risk it. But I was able to follow my grandmother's recipe for the parmesan sauce easily enough. _That's_ the hard one. And it came out rather well, if I do say so myself."

"So great," I say a little too eagerly, and my voice cracks. Food is really, really expensive, especially the pre-cooked kind. Mankind has kind of figured out how to still raise and slaughter animals and keep up their exports for the American diet, but…

We usually just get old canned goods. If it's newer than a few years, lucky us.

"So great," Ned repeats, my faithful echo. Just a little too obvious.

"Great," Aunt May says dryly, leaning on the counter. "So… is anyone going to tell me what happened on the way home from school or do I have to beat the truth out of you?"

"Nothing happened," I say confusedly.

Ned subtly touches the tip of his nose and tries to motion towards my mouth. I yank my arm across my nose to rub it, and my sleeve comes away smeared with blood.

"Oh," I say, "That… that was nothing."

"It was Flash Thompson," MJ says.

"I'll call his parents…" Aunt May begins.

"No no no!" Ned and I both screech at the same time.

"Whoa, okay, chill," Aunt May responds. "Boys. Seriously."

"He's already pissed at me because of Uncle Ben's graduation gift," I sigh.

"You _told_ Flash Thompson?" May looks incredulous.

"No, he overheard. But he didn't hear all of it. He thought it was part of the decathlon scholarship. He thought I was taking his spot."

"That's ridiculous."

"I know it is."

"So you got into a fight about it?"

"It's not Peter's fault, honestly," MJ intercedes. As usual. "Flash and his buddies hit him and Ned and I told them to clear out. It was over…"

"In a flash," Ned adds.

"You've always been the comedian of this group," MJ replies, deadpan.

"Yeah, I know," he says, "It's in my blood."

"Jesus Christ," Aunt May mutters, pulling a bag of frozen mixed veggies out of the freezer and handing it to me. "Put that on your face, baby."

I slap it a little too hard into my mouth. "'Kay."

"I need to finish this," Aunt May makes a circular motion with her finger. "You guys should get some homework done before dinner. Deal?"

"Deal," Ned and MJ say simultaneously. They both skirt quickly out of the kitchen and down the hall towards my bedroom.

"Hey, sweetie, uh," Aunt May tugs on my arm to keep me from following. "Was that - um - was that the whole truth? Or… you know…"

"It wasn't a Spider-Man thing," I assure her. "I promise. Cross my heart. It was exactly what they said. Flash Thompson."

"And MJ still doesn't know?"

"No. I'd like to keep it that way. For as long as I can."

"It seems a little sad," May continues, "I don't know. Keeping one best friend in the dark like that."

"I'm really sorry, Aunt May," I say again. I've apologized to her a thousand times, and I feel like it'll never be enough. "If I could have kept it a secret from _everyone_ I knew, I would have."

"Even me and Ned?"

"Especially you and Ned." I put the frozen vegetables back in the freezer. "I'm fine. We can save this."

I can't mistake the hurt that appears in her eyes. "I know," she says instead, but her heart isn't in it. She gestures to the hall. "Go on, get some work done."

"Sorry," I say again. Once more doesn't make much of a difference, but that doesn't mean I don't try. Every time.

I go into my bedroom and Ned is reading my uncle's letter.

"Oh, uh…" I say awkwardly.

"Dude, I'm sorry, it was just sitting out," Ned hands it to me quickly.

"What is that?" MJ has claimed the top bunk, one foot hanging off lazily and a chemistry textbook open across the pillow.

"It's just… the letter Aunt May found. The one I told you about." I fold it quickly and hold it awkwardly in my hands.

"I'm a snoop," Ned admits. "Sorry I read it without asking."

"Can I read it?" MJ asks.

"Um…" I take a deep breath. "You're going to freak out."

She gives me a vampiric expression. Possibly dead. "I never freak out."

"You did call Flash an ignorant slut earlier," Ned points out.

"I was quoting the Office, anyone can do that," MJ won't take her eyes off me. "It's… it's okay. Don't worry about it."

She's my best friend. My _bestest friend._ Someone I'm head over heels for. Someone I'm keeping huge secrets from.

Maybe I owe her just a little.

"Okay," I say slowly. "Just… my parents… they worked with Shield. I've never told anyone that. So. Don't freak out."

MJ gives me a trusting smile, and I put the wide card envelope into her hand. "If I freaked out every time someone was associated with Shield, or the Avengers, I'd be a lot less fun to hang out with, wouldn't I?"

Ned hums guiltily and looks towards the window.

I sit at my desk and try to look busy. I listen for the crinkle of envelope, and the unfolding of plain, white paper inside.

The room falls quiet except for Ned's shuffling, taking his usual spot on the lower bunk and digging through his backpack for his pencil bag.

I sneak a peek at Michelle, waiting to watch her eyes flick from side to side of the page, and grow slightly bigger when she reads something that stands out.

I wait.

* * *

 _Dear Peter,_

 _Okay, before we get to the congratulations and the fun part, I have to get scentimental. Bear with me. Before the world as I knew it ended, Thanos was my biggest worry. Everyone knows the story I bet, it's probably part of your school curriculum now. It's hard to believe it was so long ago now. You were six months old._

 _I've told you this before, but it bears repeating; your parents would have never left Earth if they had known they would be killed in the battle and leaving you without parents. They loved you so much. They loved you more than the world. Sometimes it seems like we were there by sheer accident. We were just a couple of Shield agents, picked by Captain America and Nick Fury to go off-planet and devise a plan with the Asgardians to save the world. We were there to strategize, not to fight. I know I thought I was pretty special. A lot of us did._

 _But your parents didn't, they loved you more than life. They loved you so much, they would have let Asgard fall to be at your side. They would have left everything behind for you. They loved you that much; beyond reason, beyond belief, infinitely._

 _Your parents died so bravely, Peter. And their last thoughts were of you - always you._

 _When you grow up, there's going to be moments of self doubt. You should never, ever doubt their love for you. People die, but love can't. It's always there._

 _That goes for your aunt and I, too. I know this wasn't the family you planned on. Life hasn't been easy. Remember when New York had trees and sunshine? I miss it too. Here comes the fun part. I'm going to take you and May to a place with blue skies again. There is a planet I went to on my travels called Xandar. It's a beautiful place, and I think you would really love it. They have a really great college program, and my contacts there tell me that tuition is free for kids from Earth. Don't read into that too much. You know I want you to go to college wherever YOU want to go._

 _You don't have to answer right away. This is part of your present. I have a delivery to make off-planet anyway, and it's about time you got some fresh air. We have tickets for Xandar for a little family vacation, and there's an extra ticket for Ned, too, if he'd like to come. If we get there and you would like to stay, then we'll stay. If you want to come back home, we'll come back. This is about your future. I'm privileged to be a part of it. I love you son. Congratulations!_

 _Happy Graduation._

 _Uncle Ben_

 _17-13-06_

* * *

"Wow," MJ says softly, folding it up. "Wow… uh… I feel like a jackass, I'm sorry. That seems… really private."

"Yeah," I mumble quietly. "It's okay, though, really. I don't mind. You guys are my best friends."

Ned smiles at me, and I smile back.

"So what's with the lock combination at the end?" MJ asks.

I feel like my heart falls down to my stomach. "What?"

"The lock combination," MJ says. "Seventeen thirteen zero six."

"Isn't… I didn't notice. Isn't that a date?" I ask. I feel like my blood is draining out of my face. "Year 2017, right? I mean. I just figured. He died last year and the tickets are still good to use. So..."

"I mean, it could be, if he switched the month and the date… six month, thirteenth day," MJ muses. "But that's not how people do it…"

"Don't Europeans do that?" Ned asks.

"My uncle wasn't from Europe," I point out. "And I honestly don't know if they do."

"Do you think it's for a safety deposit box or something?" Ned says, trying to contain his excitement. He always liked those seventh grade mystery paperbacks of the hero, the nerd, and the girl solving a ghostly treasure hunt and proving that old mansion really isn't haunted after all.

"Um," I say awkwardly, pretending to fiddle with a textbook and flipping through the pages. "He ha… has… a safe. In his closet."

Silence.

I glance up, and Michelle and Ned are both staring at me like I've suddenly sprouted a Thor hairdo.

"What?" I ask.

"Dude, you have to check this out," Ned presses. "This could be part of your present. What if the tickets are in there?"

"The tickets were in the envelope," I say lightly. "Aunt May put them on the fridge."

"Okay, so, maybe there's something else for you in there," Ned continues. "Like… money."

I give him a glare. "Probably not."

"Doesn't your aunt have the combination?" MJ asks gently.

"No… no she doesn't. It's been something she's been really upset about. She asked me to take it to the Avenger's facility and ask if they can use their super-whatever technology to break it open for us."

"Would they do that for an intern?" MJ exclaims. "Really?"

"Not so much," I say quickly. "And it's kind of weird for me to ask them. That's why I haven't. And why it's still in the closet."

Another pause, heavy and conflicting.

"Don't you WANT to know what's in there?" Ned asks.

"Of course I do," I mumble. "But I don't want to upset May. I really, really don't."

"So don't tell her," MJ says quickly. "Don't… don't tell her. What if it's something that's for her, too? Then you can surprise her."

"Um…"

"I'll go to the kitchen right _now_ and distract her for five minutes and make sure she doesn't go in there," MJ continues, her eyes lighting up. Paperback mystery junkies, both of them, apparently. "I'll tell her I need… girl advice. I'll have her undivided attention."

"What could you possibly need advice about?" Ned wonders, a little too loudly.

"Hey, well," MJ slips off the top bunk and pops her knuckles. "Even goddesses like myself must seek the counsel of older, wiser ones. So." She looks at me. "Are we doing this, or what?"

I sort of wish she'd say something like that to me in a different context, like, you know, kissing. That'd be great.

"Sure," I reply uneasily, grinning widely, but my voice cracks. "Okay. Yeah. Ned and I will check it out. And you… do the girl thing."

MJ nods with a serious expression. "Don't fuck it up, boys."

Ned and I creep out of the hall and wait until we hear MJ strike up a conversation in the kitchen.

"Hey, May," MJ asks quietly. Too quiet for Ned to hear, but, she doesn't know about my super-secret-hearing-abilities. Another Spider-Man perk. "I was wondering if I could bug you about… something."

"Um, yeah, sure, sweetie," I hear May instantly pull out a dining chair for her. "Anything. What's up?"

"So there's… there's this guy I _really_ like…"

Ned rolls his eyes. "Oh _please."_

"Dude, shut up," I nudge him out of the way and tiptoe down the hall, motioning for him to follow me. He shuffles quietly enough.

Luckily, May didn't shut her door, so there's no fiddling around with the old knob to try and keep it from creaking. I push the door open quickly enough to keep the squeak in the hinges from sounding the alarm, slip inside, and then open it a little wider for Ned.

Ned leans against the doorframe to keep watch. But with it being the dead-end hallway with only three doors - my bedroom, the bathroom, and Aunt May's room - there's no way he'd be able to fake doing something else if Aunt May were to suddenly walk around the corner.

Why we're even being so secretive, I don't know.

I walk over to the closet and open the double doors carefully. They creak and clatter, but the trilling tones of the microwave timer beeping in the kitchen sort of drowns it out.

For a moment, the smell of Uncle Ben's shirts still hanging inside wash over me. Part of me wants to grab a sleeve and carry it with me everywhere, but that's… sort of creepy.

I look at the small, cube-shaped safe at the bottom of the closet.

"Here goes nothing," I whisper, punching in the code.

17-13-06

The light turns green, and I crank the small handle and open the door.

 _Holy shit._

There's nothing inside except for a small, triangular shaped container, like a sheath for a curved dagger. The container is thin, like a crescent-moon-shaped wallet, made out of silver and onyx instead of leather. It's closed with a clasp I can't identify, and the lid glows with an icy blue color.

I reach in carefully and touch it lightly with one finger. It feels sort of… warm, but it sends shivers cascading up my arm and down my spine.

Okay, then.

I pick it up very slowly and hold it loosely in the palm of my hand, testing the weight. It's very… light, but the lightness feels forced… as if the container is built to suspend something much heavier or stronger inside, like a diamond encased in gelatin.

"Weird," I whisper.

"What is it?" Ned hisses.

"Give me a second," I cover the container with my hand, holding it in between my palms like I caught a butterfly. I close the safe with my foot, clicking it shut, and then bump the closet handles with my elbow till they're pushed into place.

"Come on, let's go," I say as quietly as I can. "Back to my room. Let's go. Come on!"

Ned shuffles comedically back towards the kitchen, and I slip into my room and wait around the corner, nearly pressing myself into my closet.

I hear Ned ask Aunt May politely for a glass of water, and apologizes to MJ for interrupting their girl talk.

"Naw, it's okay, we were just… yeah, wrapping up," MJ says loudly. "Thanks, May."

"Any time, sweetie. That's what… what I'm here for. Really."

I hear them laughing pleasantly together before my friends leave the kitchen.

MJ walks as casually as she can back into my room, and we both wait in absolute silence, staring at each other.

"What is that?" she mouths, looking at my closed hands.

I open my palms up and show her the box.

"What the FUUUUU," she expresses silently.

Ned returns with a glass of water and shuts the door behind him, planting the glass quickly on my desk and whirling on me.

"What IS THAT?" he shrieks.

"Shhhh, dude," I whisper. "Can you NOT?"

"What is IT?" he repeats, quieter this time.

"I have no idea. Really. Watch," I move the box slightly, and the icy blue tone shifts and glitters, like a crystal reflecting sunlight.

"Wow," MJ breathes. "That's… super weird."

"Can you open it?" Ned asks.

"Should I try?" I ask hesitantly. "What if it's like… I don't know. Dangerous or something?"

"Why would your uncle leave something _dangerous_ to you?" MJ asks logically.

"Maybe because… I don't know. Because he had no other choice?" I shrug my shoulders. "I'm not saying he'd try to _hurt_ me. But if he felt like he couldn't trust someone, other than Aunt May and me, then…"

"That makes sense," Ned says, "I mean, if he was an Agent of Shield, maybe he couldn't trust a lot of people."

"Except you," MJ says. "So. I don't think opening it is going to trigger like, a cataclysmic catastrophe on a global scale."

"You're probably right," I sigh. "Okay. Um. Here goes nothing."

I push at the clasp and try to figure out what it is, exactly. It's silver and cylindrical and _tiny._ A small piece slides out, and a seam in the middle, long-ways, suddenly clicks open.

I lift the top half. Opening the container leaves two matching sides, like a Pisces zodiac symbol, and the inside is dark, thick metal. Nestled inside is a tiny, warm-colored jewel. No, not a jewel, it's not a fancy cut like diamonds and whatever those things are.

It's a small rock. Glowing orange, the colors alive inside and roaming like the reflection of water on a wall beside a lit pool.

My Spider-senses seem to jolt and wriggle with an electrifying frenzy, undulating under my skin and causing a cold sweat to break out under my hair and down my back.

What the hell?

"What the hell is that?" MJ echoes my thoughts.

"I have no idea," I whisper. "It's uh… it's uh…"

MJ reaches out to touch it, and I jerk my hands back.

"Dude," MJ exclaims. "Chil. I'm not going to take it out."

I give Ned a look over MJ's head, as she ducks down to take a closer look. I make a knife cutting motion across my throat. "It just seems really… dangerous," I add lamely. "I wouldn't touch it unless we know what it is."

Ned understands what I mean instantly. He trusts the Spider-sense more than me sometimes. "Yeah, it could be like, the ark of the covenant from Indiana Jones," Ned exclaims. "Maybe you touch it and you _burn up."_

MJ leans back again. "It's a stone. And a pretty one."

"It's giving me bad vibes," Ned interjects quickly. "Super-bad-vibes."

"Vibes? Really?" MJ looks as him incredulously.

I close the container quickly, and it clicks shut. "This seems… really… weird, don't you think?"

"Maybe it's the delivery he mentioned in the letter," Ned ponders. "Like… maybe it's a gift for Thor or something. And he planned on sending it by some galaxy-post-office while you were on Xandar."

"A gift for Thor?" I snort.

"If it's a gift, it's probably for May," MJ points out. "Think about it. Your uncle meant for this to go with the letter. He talked about being at the final stand on Asgard, so maybe it's _from_ Asgard. It's probably like, the Asgardian version of a spessartite garnet or an imperial topaz."

Ned's eyes widen. "How do you even know the names of orange jewelry off the top of your head like that?"

"Because I'm effing smart and I study for decathlons, okay?" MJ snaps.

"Maybe it's not Asgardian at all," I breathe a small sigh of relief. "Maybe it's just… yeah. One of those. Topaz."

"But what about the dangerous part?" Ned pushes.

I widen my eyes at him and purse my lips shut.

"I mean… well, it just seems weird, I guess," Ned backpedals. "Maybe you could ask Tony Stark about it."

"How is that weirder than asking them to open a safe for you?" MJ asks.

"Well, it's not asking them to use technology barred to the general public," I offer. "And it's not asking any special favors. I could just… show it to him and ask him what it is. If he knows."

Silence falls.

"How am I supposed to concentrate on my homework now?" moans Ned. "This is the best worst thing that's _ever_ happened to us."

"Um," MJ points out. "Except for the part where Peter needs a new mask?"

"And I don't have any money," I interject awkwardly, and then bite my lip. Oops. I really, really try not bringing up the fact that Aunt May and I are… poor.

I don't really know if either of them realize that receiving the tickets was like being handed the keys to escape our own coffins.

"I'll ask my parents if they have an extra one," Ned says quickly. "I'm sure they do. I'll bring it to school tomorrow."

"Thanks, Ned."

MJ hoists herself onto the top bunk again with a sigh. "Let's do chemistry. Please? Anyone?"

"I read the chapter already," Ned grins widely. "Study hall is awesome."

MJ points her pencil in my direction. "Don't forget to tell Ned and I how it goes tomorrow."

"Uh huh."

"You _are_ going to the Avengers facility tomorrow, right? For the internship?"

"Yep…"

"And you're going to ask Tony Stark?"

"I mean, yeah, I'll try, if he's there."

"Great," MJ responds. "Text Ned and I _right_ after."

"Okay, okay," I set the container carefully on my desk next to my open textbook. The light plays across the light blue surface, casting a slight reflection on the wall above my desk. I still feel the warmth in my hand even without it there. "Did either of you use the study guide for this chapter?"

Ned and MJ both scoff simultaneously. Study guides, apparently, are for the weak.

...

I don't go to the Avengers facility as planned.

"CAPTAIN GUN PICK UP!" screeches Ned, running by me at a full sprint.

"A what?" I call after him, slamming my locker shut and staring at him.

I've never seen him move so quickly in my life. I'd be concerned, except my spider-senses are practically asleep right now. There is nothing to be worried about, unless you're a Ned.

"CAPPINGONEPICKUP!" he yells again, turning the corner ahead and disappearing.

The school halls are nearly completely empty at this point, the final bell rang ages ago. Only MJ is still at her locker thirty yards away, struggling to shove an overly large textbook into a backpack already full with books that she probably reads for fun and has nothing to do with school.

The crescent-shaped container for the orange jewel is in my pocket, and I could almost swear it radiates a sort of hum - something completely unheard by both Ned and MJ when I asked this morning.

I stare at MJ down the hall. Part of me wants to just walk up to her and ask if she wants to get a coffee or something. It is Friday, after all. And next week is finals, half days, locker clean outs… the end of our high school careers.

Maybe she won't think it's weird for me to ask. Maybe she'll ask why I'm not inviting Ned too. Or maybe she'll ask me right out if it's a date - that seems like something she'd do.

Then I'll have to decide first if I'm going to answer that honestly or not. If she asks me if it's a date, saying yes will be admitting my feelings for her. Saying no will mean I'm saving face and we're just two best buds getting drinks. And then it will be wrong to not include Ned, which defeats the purpose of the date… some time where I can just pretend we are more together than we are…

I'm halfway to her now, barely realizing I've placed one foot in front of the other.

I open my mouth to call out her name.

"Hey, Jones," a tall, lanky guy suddenly appears out of a classroom door directly across from her, throwing his arms around her from behind and burying his face into her neck. "What'd that book ever do to you, huh?"

"It refuses to obey my commands to fit inside this backpack," she replies, with that dry humor of hers. Then she giggles.

 _Giggles._

And turns her face slightly, kissing him on the lips, and just out of the corner of her eye, notices me.

"Peter," she doesn't pull away from the guy, but she turns her head to address me. She's not embarrassed at all - because that's not MJ - she owns everything she does. "Peter, this is Shawn. Shawn, this is Peter."

I know Shawn. I know he's in band, works with the yearbook. He can dance, sing, and draw. He runs on the track team. He's a likeable, nice guy. He's in our class. He's friendly with everyone.

He's really tall. Taller than me. He has long-ish brown hair, sorta straight and pointy. It would look gross and like a rockstar wannabe on anyone else, but with Shawn, it just looks… elvish. His ears have large, quarter-sized gauges, and he wears nice sweaters and scarves. Very metro.

"Hi," I blurt out.

"We've met before," Shawn detaches himself from around MJ and holds out a hand. "Remember we were partnered freshman year for the volcano project?"

"Right," I paste a faux-grin on my face and shake his hand, easing up on the firmness because I might - accidentally - crush his hand and pulverize his bones in mine. "Nice to see you again."

"Shawn and I were thinking of grabbing coffee," MJ says, handing the offending book to him. He holds it as if she just handed him a newborn child. She zips the backpack shut. "Do you want to come?"

"Oh, uh, maybe, I should probably go see why Ned was yelling," I smile and act overly casual. "He seemed to be freaking out about something."

"He's late getting his cap and gown, they're about to lock the gym," MJ narrows her eyes at me. "You _did_ remember to get your cap and gown today, right?"

My eyes widen. "That's today?"

MJ laughs outright. "Oh my _god,_ Peter."

"Better run fast, Pete," Shawn adds.

"Uh, right, yeah, thanks guys," I turn and shuffle quickly down the hall, aiming for the same exit.

"Maybe faster," MJ suggests loudly, and I start sprinting.

"Damn, he IS fast," Shawn says, not expecting me to overhear. "Why didn't he ever join track or football or something?"

"Don't you know?" MJ responds. "You're dating a nerd, so I shall educate you. People like Peter, Ned, and I prefer sweating it out in PE and graduating on the absolute _fewest_ athletic credits as we possibly can."

Shawn laughs appreciatively. I hear them kiss again.

I turn the corner and check the top of the stairwell. The building is practically empty. Closing my eyes and concentrating, I can hear - for the most part - where people are, and aren't, as long as they're noisy enough.

I hear a fly land on a window three stories down.

I hear Ned leave the building four stories down.

Cool.

I jump through the opening in the stairwell, plunge down three stories at a deadfall, catch part of the railing with a bare hand, and swing myself down and over the last story.

Feet first, I plunge them right into the double doors, and they swing open with a wide crash and I run out onto the sidewalk by the gym entrance.

Ned is opening the other door and beckoning to me. "Dude come ON! They are so pissed."

I hurry up to him and he holds the door open for me.

Mrs. Morgan is standing inside the gym atrium with a pinched expression, her white top-knot higher than ever and hands clasped as if she's praying for our souls.

"Ned Leeds and Peter Parker," she intones dryly. "My last two pick-ups of the day. Should have guessed."

"Is it too late?" I ask.

If her left eyebrow went any higher, they'd be on top of the Empire State building.

"No," she says shortly. She leads us to a white folded table, where two gowns wait in a very large basket. She scratches our names off a list on a clipboard, picks up the two gowns tucked into their plastic zippered bags, and hands them to us. "You know, teachers don't get paid for the time we sit around _after_ the bell goes off," she reminds us drolly while we scramble to stuff the gowns into our backpacks.

"We're so, so sorry," I say quickly. I grab Ned's shoulder and push him back towards the door.

"We won't do it again," Ned promises.

"Uh huh," Mrs. Morgan replies, with a roll of her eyes. "I would be worried if you did. As you would not be a student here any longer. Please don't show up for next year's graduation."

"Oh, duh," giggles Ned.

"And boys?" Mrs. Morgan adds.

We both turn slowly, worried now. "Yes?"

"Please. Put your masks on. I hate seeing my students walk from building to building even for a minute without them."

"Yes ma'am," I respond. Ned and I both dig into our backpacks and withdraw our masks, fitting them over our faces before we open the doors again.

Ned's parents didn't have an extra mask, so my hose now has a patch of duct tape. I'm sure there's something at the Avenger's facility I can use, but I have to get there first.

We step back out into the late afternoon sunshine. Which isn't really sunshine. For a moment I can pretend the yellow light is from a setting sun, but no such luck.

"So," I say awkwardly, voice muffled by the mask. "Did you know that MJ had a boyfriend?"

"I mean… kinda?" Ned replies. "Why? Didn't you?"

"I just met him like… officially. I mean. They were kind of kissing and I interrupted."

"Oh. Yeah. I mean. I figured she was dating someone. She was on her phone a lot more and got all hissy about it."

"Hissy?"

"Yeah, like, secretive. And she hasn't been hanging out with us as much."

"I wonder why she didn't tell us yesterday?"

"Probably because she knew you'd act weird about it."

"I'm not acting weird."

"Yeah, you kind of are."

"I'm not. I'm just surprised that she didn't confide in us. You know. We're her best friends."

"False," Ned holds up a finger. "She is _our_ best friend. We're not _her_ best friends. We're just two guys she hangs out with when she wants someone to do homework with."

"I never thought of it like that."

"Yeah, well," Ned shrugs. "Truth hurts I guess."

I sigh and look away. "It does. A little."

Ned gives me a look. "I know you like her, you know."

"I figured that."

"Are you ever going to tell her?"

"I can't now, can I? I'll just ruin whatever friendship I imagined was there and make it weird. Plus, Shawn's a nice guy, and Michelle really seems to like him. I'm not going to get in the way of that. Not if she's happy."

"Doesn't lawful good ever get tiring?" Ned asks.

"What does that even _mean?"_

"Like stop being a hero for two seconds and doing something selfish for once?"

"I'm selfish all the time."

"Not like normal people are selfish."

"I don't even know what to say to that."

"Well," Ned shrugs, "It's hard to explain."

"You're a genius. Try me."

"I'm good with computers," he beams widely.

"That's… not what I meant."

"Hey," Ned brightens and does a complete 180. "You're going to go talk to Tony Stark today, right? About the stone thing?"

"Um… yeah, I mean, I was planning on it…" I check the time on my phone. "I missed the train."

"Oh. Okay," Ned looks like they just cancelled Firefly all over again. "Maybe… tomorrow?"

"My graduation party is tomorrow."

"I almost forgot. You're doing yours the weekend _before_ our last week. Nick's Pizza, right?"

"Yeah!"

"I'll be there!" Ned grins. "Maybe we can sneak upstate before your party?"

I give him a disbelieving look. "You're crazy if you think I can sneak away from May tomorrow."

"I've been accused of worse!" he holds out his hand for a hi-five. "Still your guy in the chair?"

I shake my head and fight back a laugh. "Always."

We conduct our super-secret (but not so secret since we've been doing for four years) best-friend handshake.

By the time we finally memorized the whole thing, it was too late and we realized secret handshakes were no longer cool.

But Ned and I have never been _cool_ guys.

Not like Shawn. Shawn's a cool guy and genuinely nice to people. Michelle is an edgy girl who sees right through people's bullshit, pretending to be anything you're not immediately pushes her away, keeps her at arm's length. She wouldn't be able to be with anyone less than Shawn's type - honest. Transparent. Kind.

It's kind of terrible how perfect they seem for each other.

…

Nick's Pizza has a sign on the door that says _CLOSING SALE. MAKE YOUR BEST OFFER._

"Oh my _god,"_ Aunt May says to one of the workers over the counter. "You guys are still… uh… open, right?"

"Of course," the man says quickly, an apologetic smile on his face. "We're open for at least another month. But yeah, we're um… accepting offers on the stuff to make the sale a little easier. Like the booths and the stuff on the walls."

"I'm really sorry to hear that," Aunt May replies, giving me a slightly panicked look.

"So what can I get for you?"

"I called and made a reservation. I know you don't normally do that but we're expecting a few people. The Parkers?"

"Gotcha! Yeah you have the big table right here. Can I get you started with waters and drinks?"

"Thank you. Yes. Coke for me. Peter?"

"Just water, thanks!"

May leads me to the table with the small _reserved_ card sitting on it. With a goofy grin, she then opens the large garbage bag she's been clutching.

There's two _CONGRATULATIONS_ balloons inside. Freed of the bag, they rise up and tug at the end of their strings.

I laugh outright. "You were holding that bag really tightly."

"The bag was trying to float away!" Aunt May ties the strings to the back of the chair.

Ned and his parents walk through the door, and then MJ and… Shawn. Yay. Uncle Ben's partner from Shield, Sharon Carter, comes in carrying a cake.

Suddenly there's a small crowd and everyone is hugging and talking and laughing. The noise is a little overwhelming but I do what I'm supposed to do; I laugh, I say thank-you, I hug everyone (I don't hug Shawn). Mr. and Mrs. Leeds act just like their son, peppering with questions, too many hugs, round faces beaming with huge smiles.

I accept the cards and nod sheepishly at the multitude of congratulations. I exclaim over the cake, which Sharon informs me she made it herself, and then heads back for the kitchen to ask for extra plates and forks.

"Who's that?" Ned whispers when she steps away.

"Uncle Ben's stepsister," I say, using their old cover. Then I try to wink.

"Why did you just wink?" Ned asks.

"I didn't," I say. "I have something in my eye." I wink again.

"Stop doing that, you're freaking me out," Ned hisses.

...

Eventually we're all sitting around enjoying our pizza and cake. The small bell above the door _DINGs_ again, and Tony Stark walks in.

Ned's mouth drops open, as do his parents.

Mr. Stark doesn't bother to take his sunglasses off, the shade seems to dissipate once he's indoors. "Sorry I'm late," he says brusquely. "I'm never on time."

MJ blinks and glances up at the ceiling, realizing the negation of his apology.

"H-hey," I say with surprise. I get up to greet him, and he shakes my hand quite formally. "I didn't know you were coming."

"Your aunt invited me."

"She did?"

"I mean it's cool, right? Inviting your super secret internship boss to your graduation party."

"It's… cool… sure…"

"Here." Mr. Stark shoves a small box at me. "Happy graduation."

I try to take the box, but he holds on to it a little too tightly.

"Open it later," he grins, and then lets go.

"O-okay," I reply, a flutter of excitement in my chest. "What is it?"

He opens his mouth, shuts it again. Wags his finger. "No. Don't play mind games with me." He abruptly turns to May and gives her a Hollywood type of greeting, a small handshake and a kiss on the cheek.

"Carter," he says, with a jolt of his chin.

"Stark," Sharon replies with a shit-eating grin. He gives her a hug.

"How do they know each other?" Ned whispers, his lips practically plastered against my ear.

"Chill," I whisper back, and I give him a look. "Just… I'll explain later, okay?"

"Hi, Tony Stark, pleasure to meet you," Mr. Stark makes the appropriate rounds, introducing himself to Ned's parents, and then MJ and Shawn.

"Ah, Michelle Jones," Mr. Stark nods when she introduces herself. "I've heard about you."

"Um. Cool," MJ doesn't know how to reply to that. "This is my boyfriend, Shawn."

"Huh," Mr. Stark's eyebrows look doubtful as he shakes his hand firmly. "Mazel tov."'

"Ah - um - okay, well, Tony, if you'd like to have a seat, please help yourself," May gestures to the table. "Pizza. Cake. I don't know if you have any dietary restrictions…"

He shakes his head. "None that I know of. You'll have to ask Pepper." Then he sits uncomfortably in the only available seat, between Ned and Shawn. Oh boy.

"I promised I wouldn't embarrass Peter," Aunt May says loudly, giving me a look.

I sit down at my spot quickly, giving her rabbit-eyes. _Yes, please, please don't…_

"But I just wanted to say something very, very fast. As is custom for graduation… things." Aunt May puts her hand on my shoulder. "We've um… been through. A lot, these last few years. I know Ben wanted to be here."

She holds her voice steady, almost monotone, but her fingers turn into a cat-like, clawing grip into my shoulder. She's nervous and losing steam.

I reach up and pat her hand gently.

"Peter really excelled in school this last year, and, um, I'm just really, really proud of you," she directs this down to me, with a warm smile. "You could have… well, you had every reason to grieve and shut down. And you didn't. And that helped me."

"Well done, Pete," Mr. Leeds says kindly. He and Mrs. Leeds are grinning happily, all sunshine and pride, like I'm their adopted kid and their seeing me off to war or something.

Mr. Stark's awkward demeanor melts into a frown, but not a bad frown, the type of frown where someone is trying not to get emotional in front of strangers. A proud expression. Proud of _me._

"So, um, Ben bought Peter's graduation present before he left," Aunt May continues. "Off-planet tickets. We're going to take a trip to Xandar and look at the collegiate programs there."

"Holy shit," Mr. Stark whispers. That truly surprised him.

"Oh my _god,"_ Sharon says. "Oh my god! Congratulations!"

Mr. and Mrs. Leeds both applaud happily.

For a split second, I think I see MJ look absolutely devastated. As if someone just died. But it's gone so fast into a congratulatory smile, that I wonder… maybe I just imagined it.

"Um, so, I guess maybe this is supposed to be a toast or something," Aunt May holds up her soda. "I'm terrible at this stuff. Congratulations, Peter. Happy graduation."

"Here here," Shawn says loudly.

Everyone raises their water or soda, and I feel my face turning tomato-red. "Thanks," I mumble. I wait till Aunt May sits down beside me again, exclaiming for everyone to please dig in and don't be shy, and I give her another hug.

"Larb you," she whispers.

"Larb you too."

…

"I'm going to take off," Mr. Stark announces to me. Everyone is standing and putting on their coats against the weirdly brisk springtime air, if you can even call it springtime. Anyhow, it's still chilly, especially when the light starts to fade.

"Can I walk you out? I have a question," I ask carefully.

"Sure thing, shortstop. May?" Mr. Stark places a kind hand on her upper back. "Thank you for having me. It's been a pleasure."

"Thank you for coming," Aunt May replies.

"Nice to meet you all," Mr. Stark waves at the room.

Everyone chimes in a goodbye.

"I'll be right back, Aunt May."

"Oh - okay, hon."

As the door swing shuts behind us, I hear Shawn gush.

"Holy _shit_ he knows _Tony Stark,"_ he giggles. "That's _unreal."_

I follow Mr. Stark outside onto the sidewalk. There's a very fancy white car at the curb. I couldn't even begin to identify what sort of car it is. It's probably new enough to use the horrible air conditions to power itself instead of contributing any new pollutions to the atmosphere.

"What's up?" Mr. Stark swings around and gives me a slightly impatient expression.

"Oh, um, well, I… I found something. I was wondering if you could tell me if it was Asgardian or not."

Mr. Stark's chin trembles, withholding laughter. "Asgardian, huh? Where'd you find it? A pawn shop?"

"No. Um. My Uncle left it for me. It's been in a safe for years. Maybe even since he got back from Asgard."

Mr. Stark's smile looks less certain. "Bring it by the facility tomorrow. What is it, exactly?"

"I… uh… well, I happen to have it on me. It didn't seem safe to leave it lying around in my room." I pull the crescent box from my pocket, holding it across to him.

"The hell is this?" Mr. Stark carefully takes it out of my hand. He's handling it like it might spring to life and bite him.

"Open it. Just… be careful."

Mr. Stark's gives me a heavy look under his furrowed brows, squinting at me over his glasses. "Are you punking me right now? I'm not in the mood."

"Is… punking even a thing? Like that old show?"

"God, you are young," Mr. Stark presses the clasp and opens the container. For a moment, his face is completely frozen, mouth hanging open. I feel the rise of my arm hair, Spider-senses tingling weirdly in shivers across my skin. Yup, still dangerous.

"Mr. Stark?" I ask.

"This… this…" Mr. Stark fumbles. I've never heard him at loss for words before.

"Do you know what it is?" I ask.

"This is… not for you," Mr. Stark closes the container quickly. "I'm confiscating this." He slides it into the inner breast-pocket of his suit.

"Wait… what?" I exclaim. "What do you mean _confiscating it?"_

"It means I am taking it back with me to the Avenger's compound tonight and…" Mr. Stark looks at me. "You said this was in a _safe?"_

"My uncle's safe."

"Where is that safe?"

"In my Aunt's closet. She's wanted to open it since he died but we didn't know the combination. But when we found the letter from Ben last week, the combination was in there. So I opened it and this was inside of it."

"I'm going to need to look at that safe," Mr. Stark starts to walk back into the restaurant.

"Wait, wait, wait," I panic. "Listen. I didn't tell her I opened it. She doesn't know. As far as she is concerned, it's still locked, and I'm too much of a shy intern to ask the Avengers for a favor to use super-special technology to unlock it. She thought the combination in the letter was the date it was written, like I did. Okay? I didn't want to upset her… I thought…"

"Thought _what?_ That you could keep this a secret from May? That does _not_ fly here."

"Not a secret. A surprise. I thought it could be, like, magical Asgardian topaz. From Ben."

"Topaz," Mr. Stark repeats. "You think this is topaz?"

"I mean, when you say it like that… okay, yeah, it sounds dumb when you say it out loud, but…"

"No buts. End of discussion."

Mr. Stark storms back into the restaurant, and I'm right on his heels.

May steps away from Sharon and approaches us, a confused look on her face. "Everything okay?" she asks.

"I hear you have a locked safe giving you some trouble," Mr. Stark says calmly.

"Oh… oh yeah, I do," Aunt May gives me a startled smile.

"It won't be a problem any longer. I'm going to have Peter bring it by the facility tomorrow. We'll see what we can do with it."

"Really?" Aunt May exclaims. "That's - that's very kind of you. Thank you. Really." She loops an arm around me, giving me an appreciative smile. She thinks I finally got over myself and asked him to unlock it for us. "Thanks sweetie," she says to me.

"No problem," I reply tightly.

"It's a deal, then. I'll see you tomorrow, Mr. Parker." Mr. Stark turns on heel and marches quickly out, taking my magical Asgardian topaz with him.

"You finally asked!" Aunt May says excitedly as soon as he's outside. "Thank you!" she gives me a huge hug.

"You're welcome," I lie uncomfortably.

Aunt May returns to her conversation with Sharon, and I sit with a slight slump between Ned and MJ.

"Not so hard after all," MJ nudges me with her elbow.

"He took the thing," I whisper.

"What thing?" Ned asks.

I glare at him. "The thing."

"Ooooh," he taps his nose. "The thing."

"Seriously? He just took it? What for?" MJ whispers.

"What thing? What are we talking about?" Shawn asks eagerly.

"Trade secret, sorry," MJ says quickly.

I try not to notice the confused, and possibly hurt expression, on Shawn's face.

I see Mr. Stark's white car scoot into traffic and peel out smoothly, the fancy engine nothing but a light purr as it disappears around the corner. Why on _earth_ he felt like he could just take it and not say why, I have no idea.

That was Uncle Ben's present to _me,_ or, part of it, anyway. I feel like someone just took something rightfully mine and spirited it away, and it doesn't seem all that fair.

"What are you going to do?" Ned asks quietly. "Demand it back?"

"You could do that, it's yours," MJ adds.

Shawn gives me a strained smile.

"You're not missing much," I tell him quickly, feeling badly about leaving him out. "I just… I have this relic from my uncle and Mr. Stark _insists_ on taking it to the Avengers facility to study it. I only just got it recently so I wasn't… well…"

"Ready to part with it yet," Shawn assumes. "I totally get it, man. Not cool." He gives me an encouraging nod. "I mean, I'm with you on that. You go over there tomorrow and just demand he gives it back. He can borrow it some other time." He blinks slowly, realizing he has no idea what it is. "What is the relic?"

"Asgardian topaz," MJ and I say in perfect, deadpan unison. The four of us fall apart in peals of laughter. Aunt May and Sharon glance over at us, warm smiles on their faces.

I reach over and open the box from Mr. Stark. Inside is small wrist brace. It's not normal looking, a little too inspector gadget and bulky to be an Apple product. More like a cyberpunk bracelet.

"What's that?" Ned asks.

"A fancy watch," I say quickly, shutting the box.

I know exactly what it is.

It's the Iron Spider suit.

...

* * *

...

* * *

 _ **NEXT:**_ Peter Parker goes to the Avengers facility to discuss exactly what his uncle left him, and what's to be done about it next... But he's not the only one interested in its future.

* * *

 **Dear readers,**

 **if this story feels a little familiar but you can't quite put your finger on it, it's because I am basing this AU on the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I will be borrowing the premise for quite possibly the biggest frickin' fanfiction of my life and I feel like I must be a crazy person for taking this on. If you like it and want me to continue, please do send a review and let me know your thoughts.**

 **Sincerely, Pip**


	2. The First Shadow

_..._

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* * *

 **...**

 **Two - The First Shadow**

 **...**

* * *

...

...

Peter Parker

…

 **...**

My gaze watches the orange stone, floating in a weird sort of suspension of blue light between two metallic devices. A small dial indicates incredible amounts of power are being used to hold it safely here.

Even some distance away, I still feel a strange, wasp-like hum radiating from it.

Clunk.

My attention slides over to Mr. Stark, where he holds up a small reader in his hand, the screen bright red.

"Like I thought," Mr. Stark taps the now-opened safe with his hand. It lets out a musical gong, gong sound. "Vibranium."

"Seriously?" I squeak. "The safe is vibranium?"

"It sounds like we'll need to have a serious talk with T'Challa," Captain America's voice comes from the blue, hologram screen hovering over one of the work tables. "If he and Ben somehow discussed this - and hid this…"

"Hmph," Mr. Stark says, "Technically. This was before his time. His dad was King then. T'Chaka would have been the one to, uh, authorize this little storage unit."

"So he definitely brought the stone from Asgard?" I ask.

Cap and Mr. Stark share a look.

"I'm a kid anymore," I say firmly. "You don't get to do the weird secret adult look thing."

"I'm pretty sure your uncle has been hiding an infinity stone this whole time," Mr. Stark says, a pained expression on his face.

I laugh out loud. "That's not…"

He's perfectly serious. And Captain America looks like he's about to attend a funeral.

"You're joking," I whisper. "That can't be an infinity stone. They were all… you know. Like. Hidden away. Weren't they? Even before the battle where… when they… that's the only reason why Captain Marvel defeated Thanos in the first place, everyone knows that. He didn't have the stones, and she overpowered him…"

"Let me break it down for you," Mr. Stark says, "My father learned how to handle and contain the infinity stones with his technology." He picks up the empty crescent-container and shakes it slightly. "This technology. Right here. This is his work."

"So where did they all go?" I ask.

"The mind stone was used by Howard Stark to create a metaphysical synthezoid android called Vision," Steve interjects, "...and he became sentient, and went to live away from the conflict."

"Wait, like, his robot became alive? Like, with a conscience?"

Mr. Stark rolls his eyes subtly. "You could say that. Let's not forget I invented Vision from the leftover Utron…"

"... mistake," interrupts Steve.

"My father is the one that canoodled with Thor and decided to put the mind stone in his head," Mr. Stark adds, with some bottled-up frustration. Obviously this has been a point of contention for a long, long time.

I've heard Mr. Stark mention something before - about being upset that Howard, his father, went off on the inter-galactic adventure while he stayed home and watched the Earth's skies, waiting for a disaster that never happened.

I wonder if Mr. Stark and his dad ever worked out their differences before Howard Stark passed away.

"The reality stone went to the Collector's safekeeping in Knowhere," Steve continues, unbothered by Mr. Stark's corrections, "And the power stone went to Xandar's vaults. The space stone went into a containment unit called the tesseract to be kept in the vaults on Asgard. The time stone was returned to the Masters of the Mystic Arts, currently kept by Dr. Strange."

I count off on my fingers. "So…if there were only five…"

"Six," Mr. Stark corrects, looking pained. "I know. Five fingers, gauntlet of insanity, it'd make sense, but, ah, it's six. One for the back of his hand," Mr. Stark taps the back of his hand. "Ol' Thanos needed six in the gauntlet for domination of reality."

I glance back at the stone, suspended in light. I feel the hum rise slightly, and my heart rate increases.

Holy shit.

HOLY SHIT.

There's no way.

"The last one - the soul stone - went missing after the battle on Asgard," Steve says quietly. "Most of us assumed it would turn up later amongst Howard Stark's other… possessions."

"Yeah, well, like I've said before, and like my father said multiple times before me," Mr. Stark replies irritably, "He didn't steal it, keep it, or use it. It disappeared then and none of us knew where." He gives me a curious glance. "Your uncle was a good man. He wouldn't have taken it if he didn't think it was the absolute safest thing he could do."

"Sure, so, giving me an infinity stone?" I ask, my voice getting a little too shrieky and panicky. _"An infinity stone."_

"Are we absolutely sure it is an infinity stone?" Steve says. "There's probably a test to…"

"I figured since you were there, Captain," Mr. Stark interrupts, "You could just look at the damn thing and say for sure."

Steve's eyes narrow and he taps his webcam sarcastically. "I am looking at it. As far as I'm concerned, it's a very beautiful replica."

I don't know why, but I don't tell them about the humming.

"We should bring it to you," Mr. Stark declares firmly. "You should look at it."

"Don't you think keeping it at the facility is safe?" Steve asks, eyebrows rising with concern. "If it is what we think it is…"

"Then literally the most obvious stronghold on the planet is a bad idea," Mr. Stark exclaims. "I was thinking of something a little more rural."

"You want to bring it here?" Steve groans. "Tony…"

"Where's here?" I ask. "Where are you, Mr. Rogers?"

"Steve, is fine," he corrects. "Just call me Steve."

"Uh. Yeah. Sure. Cap," I say awkwardly. "Where are you right now?"

Steve sighs and glares at Tony. "I'm enjoying a break. Far away."

"Not far enough," Mr. Stark laughs. "You have to go off-planet for vacation now."

Steve ignores him and looks at me with a tired smile. "I'm in Wakanda."

"Seems like that conversation with T'Challa wouldn't be so hard, now, does it?" Mr. Stark taunts. "If we have an infinity stone… here… there's nothing on Earth strong enough for it…"

"The Avengers," I point out dryly.

Mr. Stark shakes his head. "Not defend it. Or hide it. Destroy it."

"You want to destroy it?" Steve asks, with some surprise.

"We can't keep it here on Earth," Mr. Stark says quietly. "Earth is a dying planet. Everyone's going to leave or die any way. It's not safe here. And I don't trust any of the yahoos who have stones already. And I don't think any of them should have more than one, anyway. Destroying it is the best option."

"So maybe the Wakandans have the technology to destroy it," I say shyly. "What do you think, Captain?"

He gives me a thoughtful look. "Maybe. It's worth the question."

"It'd be safer in Wakanda anyway." Mr. Stark says.

"Whoa, hold up, Tony," Steve says. "You can't just bring it here and then… ask about it. That should be T'Challa's decision. Bringing the infinity stone here is like planting a huge target on the city. Who knows what kind of technologies have been built elsewhere in the galaxy to sense the presence of these things?"

"That's exactly why I don't want it here," Mr. Stark snaps. "In the most poisoned city on the planet and too close to comfort to my fiance, my friends, and my intern. It should be far away."

"Putting everyone in Wakanda at risk."

"You know, I don't see Wakandans jumping at the chance to help us here in New York when the air got destroyed, okay? I hear their dome works just perfectly keeping out the air that's killing the rest of Africa. Maybe they owe the rest of the world a little something."

"I agree with you. But it's still not your call."

"Well, um, it's mine, so it's my call," I say awkwardly. "We can pretend this conversation never happened. I'll put it back in its container and I'll show up in Wakanda to visit you, Cap, and then I'll ask Black Panther…"

"His highness," corrects Mr. Stark.

"Yeah. The King. I'll ask him for his help. He can't say no to me then."

"Assuming he still treats you like a kid, which you have sworn off," Mr. Stark argues. "Maybe he sees you as an Avenger bringing a life-threatening weapon into his borders."

"But what if…"

"It's out of the question."

I bite my lip. Mr. Stark sits heavily in a spinny chair. Steve looks off camera thoughtfully.

"I'll talk to him," Steve says. "Just… don't get your hopes up."

He ends the call.

"So…" I pick up the crescent and hold it out. "Can we put the thingy back in here?"

"Absolutely not," Mr. Stark replies. "It's staying here until further notice."

"But Uncle Ben…"

"Kid, listen," Mr. Stark spins his chair around, stomping his feet to keep him in place. He folds his hand like a steeple. "This isn't a relic. It's not topaz. It's single-handedly the most dangerous thing right now in the world. Nay, not the world. Galaxy. You and your little friends could have been pulverized if you tried to - tried to handle it. I don't know what the fuck your uncle was thinking."

I feel the blood drain out of my face. "This isn't Uncle Ben's fault. He probably just wanted me to know where it was kept. He probably planned on taking it to Xandar."

"If he was smart, he would have kept it a secret till…" Mr. Stark stops. "Nope. Backtrack. I don't mean that."

"What the hell? Till his grave? Is that what you were going to say?"

"No. Words aren't my friend. What I mean is - it would have been much safer for you if this had never come anywhere close to you."

"It's too late for that, isn't it?" I turn my back on Mr. Stark and grab my jacket and my mask, struggling to find the straps of my backpack to loop around my shoulders. "Fine. Keep it. It's not like it has anything to do with my Uncle's - y'know - legacy and last words and final wishes and whatever - or the fate of the universe - and I'm not an Avenger or anything, just the intern - so…"

"Okay, that's quite enough," Mr. Stark gets up and plants a firm hand on my shoulder. "I get that you're frustrated with me…"

I move out of his reach. "I'm sorry. That wasn't… nice of me. I'm frustrated with this. Not you."

"But you're taking it out on me, so, I do feel like I'm getting some of that," Mr. Stark winds his fingers in a windmill motion. "So this little… tantrum… stops now. Let me put it this way. No matter how sentimental you feel about this. That will not change the fact that this is dangerous and I will do whatever it takes to protect the people I care about. I don't care how it makes you feel. I am one-hundred percent okay sacrificing our good terms if it means keeping you safe."

He stops, realizing he's losing his temper too. He takes a deep breath. "Get as mad at me as you want. If you're mad, you're alive, anyway." He turns and walks back to his chair, but doesn't sit.

"Sorry," I whisper. I yank my jacket over my shoulders and walk slowly from the room, pausing at the door.

 _Peter._

"Yeah?" I ask.

Mr. Stark looks back at me, confused. "I didn't say anything."

"You didn't?"

"I'm tapped out."

"I thought you…" I blink and shake my head. "Never mind. Guess I'll see you la…" my attention slides over to the suspension hold.

The infinity stone is humming louder than it was before.

"What?" Mr. Stark asks, following my gaze.

"Do infinity stones make noises?" I ask sheepishly.

He pauses, just a little too long, his mouth pursed shut and eyebrows scrunched together. "I don't know. That's Thor's domain. Or Strange. Why?" He steps closer to me. "Did you hear something?"

"Nope," I reply. "I… no. I didn't. I'm outta here. Bye. See you tomorrow." I turn and I rush out the door, hands gripping my backpack straps like it's a parachute and I'm about to fall.

...

…

 _Tony Stark_

...

…

It doesn't matter how many times I look out this damn window.

The view still surprises me.

A dark yellow sky like Bob Ross suddenly decided his happy little clouds should be painted with dijon.

I try calling Steve again. Nothing.

I flip the phone annoyingly in my hand, feeling jittery. A few cups of coffee past legal limit, I expect.

I stand up and pace for a moment, and then pause at the door to the balcony of my lab. I just want a little fresh air. I open the sliding glass door and step outside.

My shoes doesn't make much noise here on the white, reflective surface. I rest my elbows on the railing and look out at the complex grass is dead, a sullen, colorless beige. The trees are leafless.

The view of Manhattan that we used to be able to see glittering in the far, far distance is just a smudge of dark, poison smog.

There's a heavy, silent weight to the air. No - not silent. Waiting.

I glance around curiously. Everything is a little too still. I would say maybe an approaching electrical storm, but, we don't get much of those any more. It feels like the world is holding its breath.

"Friday?" I ask.

"How can I help?"

"Do a quick scan of any approaching objects in the sky, please."

F.R.I.D.A.Y. checks for incoming, and my eye is drawn down to the parking lot. I should be seeing the kid trotting across the parking lot by now, aiming for the bus stop at the far end of the driveway.

I should really have gotten him a car for graduation, but I can only do so much before it turns into creepy boss with overly lavishing gifts instead of one Avenger just making sure the youngest Avenger is better equipped.

I don't see the kid.

Maybe he got stopped somewhere downstairs. Having a chat with Scott or something.

A shockwave slams me backwards against the windows of the building. The air rushes past me with a roar of inhuman, galactic arrival, a massive, plunging column of rainbow light slamming into the grassy yard just outside of the balcony next to the parking lot.

The force of the wind is so strong, some of the cars shift a little in place, and streaming, glittering bifrost energy radiates like a plume of nuclear disaster.

I'm already tapping a command on my wrist watch, the suit unfolding while I throw myself off the balcony, the repulsors catching in my palms and letting me land smoothly on my feet.

I approach the rainbow bridge just as it splinters shut, the whistle of air screaming into nothing and leaving a huge burn print on the ground, ashy marks like a poorly drawn tattoo of a labyrinth.

Loki Laufeyson stands in the center, brushing his palms lightly together as if he enjoys testing lotion samples at the mall.

"Sorry," I announce loudly, "We're not accepting walk-ins today. You'll need to call reception and make an appointment."

"Please, Stark," Loki replies drolly, his petulant smile usually more ready for a conversation like this. He looks exhausted and bored. "We both know why I'm here."

"March Madness?" I ask. "Y'know you missed it. Actually. By like, months. Better luck next year."

"You have something that you should not have."

"A splinter."

"A stone." Loki's mouth curls. "An infinity stone."

"Incorrect. Sorry you came all this way." I feel sweat on the back of my neck. I don't want to say this guy makes me nervous, but…

Loki walks past me, his dark black and green uniform - or, I suppose, royal robes - barely make a sound as he moves past me for the building. "I'll just see myself in."

"Well, bit of a problem there," I say quickly, the repulsors energizing and driving me up and a few feet, and over, and I land in his path again. "Cuz you weren't invited. Now. Shoo. Or should I call your brother?"

"You know my brother and I have long moved past our differences." Loki's teeth clench. "I am free of any previous… suspicions and restraints."

"Yeah. Right. Dobby's a free elf and all that. Listen. I'm sure you and Thor have worked everything out with an accelerated course of family therapy sessions but we're still on the rocks. Last time you were here, I'm pretty sure you were directing a massive alien invasion of New York City. So. It's been a little rough here. Tough to get over."

"I had nothing to do with the Chitauri invasion," Loki smiles, of course, having literally everything to do with the Chitauri invasion. "You know that was merely a misunderstanding, of course."

"See, what I, uh, misunderstood was," I recap, "Thanos expected to win, and you were promised Earth to conquer. Thanos was defeated and you went for it anyway. And then you lost."

Loki looks back at what is left of the New York skyline. "It seems to me, Stark, you have a erroneous outlook on what constitutes loss and victory." He turns back to me, lets out a short laugh, and holds out his hands. Like a truce. "Let us try again. I know that you have in your upstairs laboratory a contained infinity stone. It's a dangerous thing to have so… exposed… to the rest of the universe. I aim to take possession of it and return it safely to Asgard."

"I'm not entirely sure what sort of, uh, fancy binoculars you employ on Asgard," I say, "But we don't have a stone, and you're not setting foot in this building. End of discussion."

"You have a great mind, Anthony Stark, but lacks greatly in one distinct quality," Loki replies, still smiling, "Strategizing. What is something I can offer you right now that no one else can?"

"Asgardian breath mints?"

"Knowledge," he snaps. "Knowledge, damn you, and your infernal mediocrity. If you indeed have a stone…"

"If? Oh now you're wondering?"

"If you have a stone then you are in grave danger. I can confirm its presence. We can create a plan for removing it from Earth. Is that not what the alliance between Midgard and Asgard for? Relations between the gods and," he eyes give me an appraising look, "Our subjects."

"Last time I checked, you're uh - frost giant, and I'm an atheist, so, again, I'm sure you spend a lot of time with a thesaurus crafting your speeches - and - don't get me wrong, they're great, but, I'm afraid you've overshot the mark just a scosche. I don't need your help with anything, because we don't have a stone."

Loki's hand snakes out so quickly I don't have any time to react. Grasping me by the throat, he lifts me right up and throws - yes, throws - me over to the balcony I just vacated.

My repulsors groan and shriek and keep me from sailing right through the wall, and I land in the balcony, looking back onto the ground below.

Loki is no longer there.

"Fuck," I whisper, turning back and wrenching the door open, slamming it behind me. "Friday, I want this place on lockdown! We're in full red defense mode, y'hear? Get Scott in here. Who else is here? Is everyone on a god damn vacation?"

"It's nice to see that you have no reason to overreact," Loki's voice comes from the far end of the room.

He's looking at my lab equipment, like a thoughtful teacher checking over a student's shoulder during an exam.

"How'd you get in here so fast?" I ask with mock surprise. "Scotty on standby? Strings? Rocket packs?"

"I have my ways." His eyes are glued to the suspension hold...

Which is deactivated. No glowing blue light, no metal arm braces keeping the holographic suspension gel in place. It's completely off. We're missing the crescent-shaped containment unit, too.

Looks like we're shy of an infinity stone.

That damn… wonderful... kid…

...

…

 _Peter Parker_

...

...

 _Holy shit holy shit holy shit holy shit…_

I just stole an infinity stone.

I mean, it was sort of mine to begin with, so I guess I stole it back, but -

 _Holy shit holy shit holy shit…_

 _Is Loki following me? Did he see me?_

I guess the most important question is - can he sense it now that it's back in the crescent box? Considering we only just took it out for the first time today, using all the proper instruments to in the lab to safely touch it, and that's when Loki decides to show up, I think it's safe to say that the stone can't be sensed outside of this container.

At least not by Loki. But maybe someone worse than him?

 _OH SHITSHITSHIT._

I completely body slam Scott Lang at the front doors.

"Whoa, Gonzales, where's the fire?" he exclaims.

The whole building is literally blaring with alarms and red lights.

"UPSTAIRS UPSTAIRS UPSTAIRS," I shout incoherently, running past him and aiming for the doors.

"What is it?" Scott calls after me.

"Loki is here and I have to run for it," I scream over my shoulder. "Go help Mr. Stark!"

"What the hell?" I can tell Scott is confused by my running away from the fight, but he doesn't have time to ask. I'm already pushing the doors open and sprinting for the parking lot, and he's hitting the button on his watch to shrink down to Ant-size and fly on the back of a bug upstairs.

Oh my god. I hope Mr. Stark's okay. I'm pretty certain he can handle Loki but…

Keep going keep going keep going the fate of the planet is at stake blah blah blah…

My feet hit the pavement so hard I'm leaving tiny cracks across the asphalt in foot-shapes. Mr. Stark is going to hate that.

I finally make it to the end of the driveway and launch myself over the gate, much to the shock and exclaiming yelps of the guards. They all know me, so they don't try to stop me, but they can't leave their posts either and go investigate the alarms in the building…

"CAN'T EXPLAIN, BIG GODS, BAD THINGS," I blab loudly.

I skid to a stop thirty feet outside the gate, and there's a bus pulling away from the curb another thirty feet away.

That's my bus.

Doubling back and stealing the stone back by trying to use the special vibranium prongs invented specifically for handling dangerous space artifacts certainly shaved a few minutes off my arrival time.

"Hey wait!" I shout. Without even thinking, I burst into a run again, tugging up my sleeves of my sweater, revealing my very new wrist bracers hiding the iron spider suit. I don't activate the whole suit, but I jet off a thwip of web that smacks the back of the buss in a webbed splatter.

I didn't think this through.

The bus starts to gain speed aiming for the exit to the freeway, and my running starts to get crooked, the pavement flying by too fast beneath me, until I finally lose one slight step, one knee hyperextends, and I yelp and fly forward, body slamming the pavement.

And then I'm being dragged.

"FUUUUU…" I start to yell out, holding onto the web for dear life as the bus pulls up the slight inclined ramp to merge onto the freeway. My body flails and bounces on the cement behind it, the wind getting knocked out of me, every bone-jarring shudder sending a blast of pain through all of me.

I hit the retract button, flip over awkwardly onto my side, letting my shoulder scrape and take the brunt of impact for a moment. Part of my sweater sleeve shreds right off, the road rash erupting in painful welts where it hits, but my feet are walking up the guardrail at the sideways jogging run.

When the bus slows to turn the hairpin curve, I've pulled up alongside, and I throw myself backwards - and headfirst - onto the side of the bus, gripping the web still with one hand and slamming my other palm onto one of the windows to stabilize myself before I slide down the side entirely, hit the ground, and roll underneath.

"WOO!" I exclaim, now frozen and, thankfully, stuck in place on the side of the bus like a piece of gum.

And now I'm facing the left lane of traffic, plastered to the side, my backpack smashed between my back and the window of the bus. I feel a small throbbing at my back from the crescent box that has nothing to do with the alarming pains radiating all over my body from getting cowboy-dragged by a slow moving bus on hard ground.

I realize I'm staring into the passenger window of a small SUV speeding alongside of us.

The woman inside slowly looks over at me and lets out a shrill scream.

"SORRY!" I erupt loudly, quickly flipping around and crawling hand over hand. Creeping past the windows of the bus, I hear a few voices inside exclaiming loudly.

"There's someone clinging to the side of the bus!" I hear an elderly woman call out.

"I think it's an AVENGER!" shouts another.

I hear the bus driver reply, "This ain't a tour bus, and we ain't stopping at the complex."

"But there's someone walking up the…"

"We're not stopping the damn bus for free, I got real stops to make! No one is out there!"

I thump down on the bus roof with a tired, painful sigh. Now all I've got to do is wait for a good streetlight to pass by close enough to my exit.

Well, shit. I forgot to put my mask on.

I dig it out of my backpack quickly and fit it over my head, the filtered oxygen flooding my lungs with a slightly less-toxic freshness.

I fall backwards to relax and calm my heart rate. I take huge, raking breaths, trying not to laugh hysterically with the absurdity of it all.

I missed my bus - nearly.

Almost got an infinity stone stolen by Loki - nearly.

Definitely stole a stone from Tony Stark.

Er, stole it back.

And now I'm on the run to keep it out of Loki's hands while Iron-Man and Ant-Man fight an Asgardian.

 _Holy shit I am in so much trouble._

…

…

Aunt May hears me open the door, slamming and locking it behind me. I can hear her pausing by the stove in mid-stir, her spoon suddenly holding still, while I run into my room, dive into my closet, and jerk my suitcase out of the shelf and drop it onto the floor. Within minutes, I'm packing like a crazed animal about to go on vacation.

She appears at my door a second later, watching with a slightly unreadable expression. It looks… resigned, as if she knows what I'm doing already.

"I gotta go," I say rigidly.

"Uh huh," she replies mildly.

"End of the world," I continue.

"Tell me something I don't know."

"I have to use my ticket to get to the spaceport in Wakanda right now," I say hurriedly.

"Oh, really?"

"Don't worry, I won't leave for Xandar without you. I'll wait in Wakanda. It's just really, really important that I get there. As soon as possible."

"Hmph," she is not amused. "Graduation?"

"I'm really sorry about - you know - missing… graduation, and, everything…"

"It's your education, Peter!"

"I've already graduated. I would just miss the ceremony. They're mailing out our diplomas anyway."

"What about finals?" Aunt May asks dryly.

"Technically last week. Only a few classes are doing any final exams still and they're only freshman. None of the seniors have finals. We have to clean out our lockers instead."

"Except you, apparently."

"I have to leave the country tonight."

"Mhm," she sighs. "And why, exactly?"

"I have…" I pause, kneeling at the suitcase, not making eye contact. "We opened the safe."

She straightens. "You did what?"

I take a deep breath, folding a hoodie.

"Don't forget you the power of speech now. What was in it?" She pauses. "Peter!"

I look at her. "Uncle Ben had an infinity stone," I say slowly, thinking it better to have it all out at once. "He was hiding it in the safe. The numbers in his letter. Not… a date. A combination. There was an infinity stone inside."

I open up my backpack and slowly withdraw the bejeweled crescent, the twinkling blue lid like a picture of a tropical ocean, under the twisted, iron markings like crawling ivy. I hand it across to Aunt May.

"Don't open it," I say quietly. "It can be - uh - tracked by the bad guys when it is exposed, I think. But it's in there."

"I… I know," Aunt May whispers, holding her hand over the box. Feeling the warmth in her palm. "I can… feel it? Is that weird? Does that happen to you? It's sort of hot."

"Yeah," I gently tug the box out of her hands, and put it back in my backpack.

My room is deadly silent. I feel like there's some sort of cosmic staring contest going on between Aunt May and an invisible cobra or something.

She breaks first.

"Why the absolute fuck would he give you a fucking infinity stone?" Aunt May suddenly erupts. Her face is turning dark, her eyes red.

Oh boy. I didn't expect this reaction.

"I don't think he meant it to go like this," I say slowly. "I think he just wanted you and I to know where it was kept. Just in case. He mentioned that errand, remember? I think he was going to take the stone to Xandar."

"So leaving a fucking safe code in a graduation note was his fucking brilliant idea?" Aunt May persists. "He always had a flair for the dramatic - that was a thing about the Parker boys - always making things a little harder and more flamboyant than they needed to be."

"My dad was like that too?" I ask sheepishly.

"I'm not - we'll get into family history some other time," May says angrily.

"Maybe Uncle Ben didn't…"

"Uncle Ben maybe, Uncle Ben MIGHT HAVE, Ben could have, should have, didn't," Aunt May's voice continues to rise. "He certainly could have done a lot of fucking things, maybe not getting shot in the fucking head before being able to explain why he brought a fucking Thanos beacon in my god-damn fucking apartment."

I'm completely frozen over my half-packed bag.

It suddenly occurs to me that out of all the stages of grief I've read about, there's one that Aunt May really glossed over. Anger and bargaining.

She kind of jumped straight from devastated depression to acceptance.

Maybe I'm seeing what she missed out on.

"Well, Thanos is dead, so," I say meekly. "We don't have to worry about him. Only Loki."

"Loki?" repeats May.

"Um. Yeah. So. That's why," I lift the suitcase awkwardly, putting it back down. "That's why I'll leave really early. I have to take this to Wakanda. You can meet me there at the time we planned next weekend."

"Loki," repeats May. "As in the son of a bitch who tore apart New York? Started this whole fucking mess to begin with?"

"Yeah," I admit quietly. "That Loki."

"Why are you worried about Loki?" May asks.

"Because he - showed up at the facility this afternoon," I admit. "Mr. Stark distracted him and I ran for it."

"Oh, great," she snarls sarcastically. "That's just great. My boy is running away from an Asgardian bloodhound with a hatred for Midgardians and a criminal history of serving the guy who wanted the infinity stones in the first place."

"Don't worry," I assure her. "He never saw me."

"Did you hear that?" Aunt May suddenly looks up at the ceiling.

I feel my heart clench suddenly with fear, but she continues. "Did you hear that, Benjamin?" she continues loudly. "Our boy is running for his life with this goddamn stone of yours. You know, the one you hid in our closet like a fucking drug cache? That stone?"

My eyes itch a little at the corners, that tingling feeling right before tears begin to form. I suck in a breath and bury the feeling far, far away.

"I just wish I could say it to his face," Aunt May looks at me, her face a slight shade darker than before, like she needs to sneeze or something. "I wish I could say it to his stupid, smug, handsome face. He doesn't realize what he's done. That's not fair. He's put me, and YOU, our boy, in the most dangerous possible position on the planet - no, not even the fucking planet, in the fucking galaxy, and he doesn't even have to fucking apologize for it?" Her breath comes out in painful, sucking wheezes.

"That's not fair," I whisper, the tears sort of forming anyway. "He didn't mean to."

"I guess till death do us part is a fucking get out of jail free card," Aunt May continues. "Don't you fucking worry, Ben, you don't have to save the world any more, you get your brains blown out, and Peter and I can just take care of the Thanos rock. You just fucking enjoy your sleep. You can just fucking leave us here with this like you always fucking do."

Aunt May suddenly turns around and plunges her hand right into the drywall of the hallway, and shouts another inconsolable fuck at the top of her lungs.

"Aunt May!"

Horrified, I launch to my feet and rush at her, pulling her hand out of the wall. White dust flies everywhere, and her hand is swelling and red.

"Did you - did you - did you break your hand?" I stutter, holding it gently in front of me, afraid of putting too much pressure on it. "Are y-y-you okay?" I realize my heart is pounding way too hard. I've never seen her do something like that before. Never heard her talk that way before.

Aunt May won't look at me. She tugs her hand away, cradling it to her chest. "Sorry," she whispers lightly, her voice breaking. "I'm sorry." She wrenches her shoulder away and walks stiltedly back towards the kitchen. I hear the freezer open and she lifts out the same bag she handed to me a few days ago.

I silently follow.

A kitchen chair scrapes along the floor, and she sits in it. A sob races along her spine, but she swallows it down, staring like a dead thing at her hand without seeing it. She holds the freezer bag loosely in the other hand without using it.

I slowly pull out a second chair beside her, take the veggies out of her hand and lay the bag carefully on her knuckles. She winces.

"That was inappropriate of me," she whispers. "That's the kind of shit that people call child protective services about. Punching walls, you know. I haven't done that since I went to college. I used to be a much angrier Italian."

"It was a pretty impressive hit," I say quietly.

"It just hits me," she responds slowly, pressing her other hand against her chest, "Right here. I never know when it will. Usually I'm alone. I can hide it away. Sometimes it just hits me right here in my heart and I can't think, and I can't breathe, and I am just so angry that I have to do this alone. I'm angry he left me. Us." She buries her face in her good hand. "I don't know what to do without him. Especially if… if someone like Loki or Thanos were to…" she chokes up and can't continue.

I wrap my arms around her shoulders and hug her close to my chest. "I'm so sorry May," I whisper. "I wish I knew why he left this. It must… it must be driving him crazy, you know. Looking down at us and wishing he could explain what sort of elaborate plan he had all along. Not getting the final word on that would bug him so much."

She laughs a little in the middle of her tears. "It would." Suddenly she sits back. "I've never screamed like that before. Even in traffic. Especially not in front of you."

"It's okay."

"It's not okay at all. I don't know what came over me."

I sit back and look at her thoughtfully.

"You and your little friends could have been pulverized if you tried to - tried to handle it. I don't know what the fuck your uncle was thinking. If he was smart, he would have kept it a secret till…"

"What the hell? Till his grave? Is that what you were going to say?"

"No. Words aren't my friend. What I mean is - it would have been much safer for you if this had never come anywhere close to you."

"It's too late for that, isn't it?!"

Tony Stark and I didn't argue like that. He's Iron-Man. And I'm just the interning Avenger Spider-Man.

Aunt May just punched a wall…

Maybe it has nothing to do with us, and everything to do with handling the stone.

"I don't think it's your fault," I say thoughtfully.

"How am I not responsible for my actions?" she asks miserably.

"I think the stone has a negative influence on the people around it," I say. "Makes them… less inhibited."

"Even you?" she says doubtfully.

"Yeah," I reply. "I got into an argument with Mr. Stark…"

She snorts. "He probably started it."

"Yeah, but he wouldn't have… usually. What I mean is - it's unusual," I shrug helplessly, "It wasn't normal." I gesture to her hand. "That wasn't normal."

"I'm so sorry."

"It's okay." I stand up. "Keep that ice on. I'm going to finish packing."

She gives me a look of such sorrow that it hurts my heart.

"You're really leaving early? Missing the graduation ceremony?" she asks. "And there's nothing I can say that will make you change your mind?"

"I have to get the stone to Wakanda. There's too much red tape if we wait for permission, or another Avenger to do it for me. I have to leave tonight. Get it away from you, it just puts a big target on us… close to Ned, and MJ…"

She winces and looks away.

"What?" I ask.

"I was going to - well, tell you later. I guess I can still tell you later. In Wakanda. It's supposed to be a surprise… it's…"

"OH!" I say suddenly, "Am I ruining a surprise by going to the spaceport a week early? I'm such an idiot, I'm so sorry, I didn't even think about… like… I'm an idiot."

She pauses. "Ned and Michelle are going with us."

I blink. "They're going with us to Wakanda…? I mean - wow, that's awesome. I mean. I guess I'll be there already. I'll see them…"

"Not just to Wakanda," Aunt May turns towards me and tugs on my arm, till I sit down again at the table beside her. "To the spaceport in Wakanda. They're going to Xandar too."

I blink. "They're what?"

"You knew Uncle Ben bought an extra ticket for Ned…"

"Ned read the letter," I protest. "He didn't even take that part seriously, otherwise he would have been freaking out about going to Xandar with me. I thought you might want to… I don't know… sell the other two tickets… or something… I know we need the money, and…"

"Listen to me, please," Aunt May interrupts. "I had some… conversations… with their parents. Separately. I… proposed… letting them come with us, to look at the colleges on Xandar, too. It's a huge opportunity. And they're your best friends. I thought you might want them to come."

I blink at her. "Of course I'd want them to come, but…"

"Ned has his ticket. Your friend Michelle will use Ben's ticket. We can…" Aunt May swallows convulsively. "We can pretend all we want, sweetheart. That this is just a college road trip. Campus tours. But you know this is it. This planet is going to be uninhabitable in a year… months, maybe. Everyone will be relocating to Xandar if they can afford it, at least to take advantage of the refugee program and eventually go to Asgard or the new colonies elsewhere."

I watch her, protests and questions dying before they can emerge.

"Parents will do anything for their children," Aunt May says softly. "And it's selfish of me, I know, to keep a ticket for myself, but I can't bear the thought of losing you, so I'm going. And that's final. But the other two…"

"May…"

"When I asked Mr. and Mrs. Leeds what they thought of Ned coming with us, they wept. They couldn't… they could not express enough gratitude. They want Ned off planet as soon as he can be. They will soon follow, they promised they wouldn't be far behind."

"Holy shit," I whisper.

"Michelle's parents had a similar reaction. They - freaked out. Of course they want her to get off planet as soon as possible. They're worried they won't ever be able to afford them all going at once - if they ever get to leave at all. But they want their daughter somewhere safe. They said yes. Of course they did." She takes a deep breath. "Like I said. We'll do anything for our children. They're coming to Xandar with us."

...

…

* * *

...

* * *

 **NEXT:** Aunt May and Peter are heading for the continental transport called the Ark, but they're being followed by invested parties.

* * *

 **Dear readers,**

 **I know there is a LOT of dialogue in this, but it's where I feel the most strengthened as a writer, but never fear! This will give me plenty of exercise in the action department for upcoming battles and crazy planetary skirmishes. All the thanks go to my besta beta, Crystal, QueenofCrystallopia, for being so inspiring and so crazy talented that everything looks like a steaming pile of ya'know next to her amazing writing. If you haven't checked out the CMFU (Crystal's Marvel Fanfiction Universe) you really should. Book 1 in the series is called Paint it Black. Anywho, she's been reading over this and being so hella encouraging. And of course, all of you amazing readers (and silent favorite-followers). Also, I am going to address reviewers personally, but I'm going to wait till chapter 3! I just wana get this posted ASAP lol, you've all been so patient. (And don't worry, I haven't forgotten about my other fics... namely Down Came the Rain Retold and Where They Go. They're just a little slower to work on).**

 **So you'll definitely get responses on the next go-around! Thanks for your patience and I am SO glad you're here to read!**

 **Hugs,**

 **Pip**


	3. The Treason of Asgard

**...**

 **Three - The Treason of Asgard**

 **…**

* * *

...

...

 _Peter Parker_

...

...

I take a second to process this. Aunt May and I are leaving the planet… but not using the tickets for a round trip, which, we could, if we wanted to. It's good for both ways.

But we're not. We're going to stay in Xandar.

Ned is coming too.

And MJ.

"What about your friends?" I ask softly. "You're doing this all… for me. Don't you have someone you want to bring with you? Anyone?"

Aunt May's gaze turns to steel. "There isn't anyone I would rather take. You are my priority. If I can save a couple of other kid's lives, then, so be it. I'm happy with that. Kids come first. Always."

We're making it a one way trip, then. We won't come back.

My heart starts pounding way too hard.

"I think I need to sit down," I whisper.

"You are sitting down."

"Oh. Right." I reach over and put the forgotten bag of vegetables over her hand again.

We sit in silence for a moment, and her eyes grow slightly larger. "What did you do to your shirt?" she asks. "You're all… torn up."

"I was worse ten minutes ago. I heal fast."

"Not that fast. What did you _do?"_

"Got dragged by a runaway horse. Except it was actually a buss."

"What the hell?"

"Let's just say escaping Loki got really dramatic."

"Jesus, Peter." Aunt May shuts her eyes painfully. "You can't call yourself a friendly neighborhood Spider-Man if nothing is friendly and the neighborhood kills you."

"Well… I guess... this is Spider-Man's last day in the neighborhood."

A heavy pause. She looks away, disheartened.

"I know you love New York," she says, her voice hitching. "I do, too. My whole life is here. My memories of your uncle. When Ben and I first met… started dating… when he introduced me to his brother and your mom…" she shudders and looks down. "It's going to be hard. It's going to hurt. And we're going to be homesick. But…" she gives me a hopeful look. "Wouldn't you rather be a little hurt, and a little homesick? Than choking to death in your sleep some night because that toxic air finally gets in this old apartment that is just not quite airtight enough?"

I try to imagine a world where I'm not Spider-Man, swinging from rooftop to rooftop, playing in my burrough time and time again, helping out the Avengers…

Oh my god, I'll be leaving all the Avengers… I won't _be_ an Avenger anymore.

Earth's mightiest heroes.

I guess I can't be one without Earth.

"Yeah," I say hoarsely, my voice cracking so that the end of the word drops away.

"We're actually doing this," Aunt May whispers.

"Holy shit," I repeat, and we both let out some sort of half-laugh, half scream, scared out of our minds.

"But," I wheeze, "I still - I still have to leave early. I've got to get the stone to Wakanda."

"I'll leave early with you. I'm not letting you go alone. That's crazy."

"Ned and MJ…"

"They'll meet us there when it's time to leave. Just as planned. They'll still get their graduation ceremony." Aunt May jumps to her feet. "I guess I need to pack then, too."

"May… your hand."

"It's okay," she tucks it behind her back, embarrassed. "The… the devil made me do it."

I know she's joking, but I imagine the colors inside the stone growing a little brighter, a little more triumphant somehow. It gives me a shiver down my spine. "We have to keep the stone a secret from Ned and MJ," I say quickly. "They know it exists and that I found it, but, for now, I want to pretend that Tony Stark keeps it in the upstate compound."

"They're going to wonder why you're leaving town before the ceremony, though." Aunt May shakes her head. "Honey - don't take this the wrong way. But you're a terrible liar, and even worse at thinking big picture." She mimes a _mind blown_ gesture. "No one is going to believe you're skipping your last few days of school just because you have a sudden desire to be at the spaceport a week early when they know you have an infinity stone. Furthermore, I'm a little hurt you told them before you told me."

I wince. "There's a little bit more to the story. They were there."

"At the facility?"

"Here…?"

"But you opened the safe at the facility today. That's what you said."

"No - I… we did. But it wasn't the first time I'd opened it."

"Jesus Christ, Peter. Do you ever stop lying about everything? Are you even _Peter?_ How can I trust you are who you say you are? Maybe you're a very clever alien in disguise, and…" she gives me a squinting look. "Are you Loki?"

"What? Ew. Noooo," I exclaim awkwardly. "Of course not."

"Even worse, then. You're a compulsive liar. How on _earth_ did I raise a compulsive liar?"

"It's uh… superhero thing."

"Ah, no, it's NOT, that's what masks are for." She shuts her eyes and takes a deep breath, letting out her frustration in a slow exhale. "You can tell me the whole story on the Ark, okay?"

"We're taking the Ark?"

She gives me a tired expression. "When was the last time you saw a working plane?"

"I don't know. I haven't thought about it. A month ago?"

"Try three or four years ago. They can't fly in this air. We're grounded, bucko. The Ark is getting us to Africa."

I think about the ferry incident and grin sheepishly.

"Do you have something against boats?"

"More like boats don't like _me."_

She shuts her eyes as if I made a bad pun. "I'm… going to go get my stuff now."

"Hey Aunt May?" I venture carefully.

"Yeah?" she asks, stopping at the door.

"It's life and death," I say carefully, my voice dropping to a whisper almost involuntarily. "Loki may be after us. It's… we have to hurry."

She nods solemnly. "Then I'll pack light." She pauses a moment, stopping in the hallway. There's baby photos of me, framed school pictures, and wedding pictures of her and Ben.

She comes back into the kitchen, removes a small hammer from a drawer of junk, and starts pulling the frames from the wall one by one. Stacking them in her arms, I hear her take them down the hall and shut her bedroom door.

I can hear her start smacking the pictures with the hammer, shattering glass as she takes deep, shuddering breaths. Pulling each picture out, stacking them up, slipping them all into one envelope.

I hear her closet open, and a duffel bag comes out. The envelope is the first thing to go in, followed by something small - a smell of metal and lead…

Wow, Aunt May owns a handgun. I never knew.

I sit quietly at the table for a moment, and then finally shake myself out of my super-hearing eavesdropping.

It's time to pack. We've gotta get out of here.

…

...

 _Tony Stark_

…

...

I cough and lift my head.

Jesus, I'm covered in rubble.

I shove a huge slab of drywall and a few chunks of concrete off my suit, feeling every ding and dent with a groan.

Agh.

I wave my hand from side to side to try and get the smoke to clear to see what's left of my lab. _What's left._

Well, this will be expensive to replace.

But what's the damn point, anyway? There won't be anything left of this planet soon enough. Might as well stop investing in it now.

My suit makes a terrible whining, metallic sound. The lights in my visor flicker a little, trying to turn back on. I can't flipping see all _that_ well.

I let the visor flip up, taking a ragged inhale of smoke and that yellow air.

"Shit," I whisper. "FRIDAY? You online?"

"How can I help you?" Friday responds.

I hear a yelp of surprise, and I blink as Scott Lang emerges in his ant-man suit, normal sized, across what is left of the room. He stares at me over the rubble, standing at the edge of what used to be the floor.

There's a huge crumbled gap between us, with a small canyon of broken floor and cement looking down two floors.

"I leave you alone for one second," I call out irritably.

"Nay, good sir, I was not alone, I was pursuing my worthy adversary!" Scott calls out, his voice echoing oddly in a space that used to be small enough to _not_ have echoes. Now it's exposed to the world; and on fire. "I am afraid the god of mischief has gotten away."

"Why are you talking like that?" I groan, shoving another piece of ceiling panel off my chest. I blast another piece with my palm repulsor, watching it jettison off one direction, hit a half-wall, and plunge to the common room below. "You sound like an idiot."

"That way Loki talks," Scott answers. "It's sorta catchy. Makes me feel like a knight of the realm or something."

"Which way did he go?"

"Lost him somewhere over the river. But I haven't seen a bifrost appear in the skyline yet, so he's still floating around."

"Slithering," I snap. "He's slithering about. Not floating. He's a fucking snake." I push myself up and balance preciously, kicking what might be a part of a cinderblock away from me. It falls of the edge of what used to the be the floor beneath the conference table where I was talking to Steve, and I hear the sound of glass shattering below.

Scott looks uncomfortable. "You going to fly over here, or what? That doesn't look entirely stable."

"It's not." I turn slightly away from him. "Friday, call Underoos."

"Who's that?" Scott laughs.

I feel a pain in my chest tighten. So, that's how it's going to be then, is it? You know damn well who that is, Scott _Lang._

The call is answered right away.

"Mr. Stark," says Peter's voice. "I'm so sorry. I saw Loki land, I panicked, I stole it. Are you okay? Is Scott okay?"

"Scott's perfectly fine," I say easily, giving Scott a thumbs up.

Scott grins uncomfortably back.

"What about you?" Peter asks urgently. "Did you defeat him?"

I give Scott a look. "Don't you worry, Loki is on the run - like a little bitch."

Scott's eyes narrow.

"Oh, okay," Peter sounds relieved. "Maybe… maybe I was rushing into this. Maybe Aunt May and I can take our time. Leave when we planned. If we've got him on the run…"

"No, no, we don't, not really," I say quickly.

"You don't?"

"Not at all. We have absolutely no need for you to bring pineapples to the party. You know what I really prefer? Black Cat coffee. You've had that, right? The caffeine is just… illegal dosages, really." I fake laugh. "Stop distracting me with cuisine. Needed to report that we've got Loki on the run. And that's really the best move if he knows what's good for him. Running."

Scott lets out a fake laugh, too.

Silence.

"Oh shit," Peter whispers.

"You are correct about that," I answer. "And there's a lot of it. Plenty."

Scott is still waiting, the smile gone.

"Stick with your previous plan," I say. "And do it ASAP. That coffee FLIES off the shelves now because Earth just can't sustain it any longer. It really shouldn't - well, it won't… be here anymore. Not for much longer. You know that. Right?"

"I… yeah. I know what you're saying. Can anyone hear me?"

"No one."

"I'll take the stone to Wakanda. Aunt May and I will get it off planet. We'll leave now."

"Good," I say quietly. "Good. Well done."

"Are… are you going to be okay? Why are we talking in code?"

"Nothing's for certain. I got a mission. Take care of yourself."

"Wait - if you need help - send a signal, or…"

"Friday, end call."

"WAIT…"

The call ends and I repulse my armor off the edge of the slab, flying crookedly as bits and pieces of drywall fall off of me. I land on the same bit of flooring that Scott is waiting on, tapping his foot with agitation.

"Come on, short stop," I say, slapping his shoulder. "Let's track Loki down."

"Yes, of course," Scott salutes and plunges right ahead, walking through a hallway half-blown-open. The stairs are missing half the stairwell.

I had only lost consciousness for a second, when Loki threw me into the wall and plowed through a few layers of my laboratory. I don't know what happened to Scott during those few minutes. We fought, I hit, he hit just a little harder.

"So you don't remember Underoos, huh?" I ask.

"No, not at all," Scott replies flippantly.

"Eh, that's okay," I say. "Scott couldn't remember you, either. Thought you were like… the god of candlewax or something."

Scott stops in mid step, and turns around. There's a slight shimmer at the edges of his body, and his eyes flash green.

He smiles at me.

I sense movement behind me, and the sound of a scepter plunging through my armor.

…

...

 _Peter Parker_

…

...

We're just two small shadows in the back of a New York cab, heading for the harbor where they dock the Ark - the biggest refugee freighter ship in the world. It used to be a helicarrier for Shield, before the last of them left Earth and joined Sword. Only a few people remained behind; Sharon Carter, for instance. But she has passage waiting from her old team as soon as she wants it. Truthfully, I think the only reason she stayed behind for as long as she did was because she felt like she had to keep an eye out for May and I. Residual guilt from Ben's death, maybe. She had known my parents, and she was Ben's partner whenever they worked together.

Maybe now that Aunt May and I will be off planet, she'll feel like she can leave too.

I text Ned what Aunt May and I agreed on.

 _Ned, we ran into some trouble with the you-know-what. I'm going to miss the graduation ceremony. Will you grab my diploma for me? You already have a mailbox key._

 _Um, shit, dude, yes? I'll grab it but what happened?_

 _I can't talk about it yet. Don't worry though, everyone is fine._

I think about Mr. Stark's cryptic conversation and feel worry crippling my stomach. Maybe not everyone.

 _My parents told me it was okay to go to Xandar with you. Is that still happening?_

 _Of course. Space port in Wakanda, one week from now. Don't be late._

 _I'll be there! I'm so excited!_

 _Me too._

 _I gtbh, I thought maybe you didn't want me to come. You didn't say anything when I read Ben's letter_

 _I wanted you to come SO BAD,_ I reply. _But I thought May might need to sell the extra tickets. I didn't want to say anything yet. I was too freaked out and distracted by the stone anyway_

"Everything okay with Ned?" May asks carefully, being kind enough not to hover over my shoulder.

"He's more than okay; he's great. He'll still meet us in Wakanda next week."

"Good, good," Aunt May says softly. She hugs her large messenger bag a little tighter; the one she put all of the important stuff in. The family photos in the envelope. Our birth certificates. Uncle Ben's death certificate. Her insurance information. Passports. The emergency credit card.

And, I'm guessing, the gun.

 _I can't believe you get to bail on graduation. You're so lucky_

 _I wish I didn't have to bail. This is everything we've been working for_

 _Yeah, that's true._

He sends me a gif of Elmo shrugging helplessly.

I snicker and show May.

She tries to smile, but it barely works.

"How's your hand?" I ask.

"It's okay," she lies, and then rolls her eyes at me when she sees my piercing stare. "It's throbbing."

"We can buy something cold from a vending machine at the harbor I bet. Hold it on your hand. That'll make it feel better."

My phone buzzes again.

 _So you're taking the thingy to Wakanda._

 _Yeah, there's someone after us. It's very dangerous. Please be careful; and watch out for MJ. And Shawn. If you can let them know why I'm not there without telling them. Somehow?_

 _Guy in the chair._

 _I'm sorry I'm always asking you to lie for me!_

 _Your Aunt is letting me go to Xandar with you?! I think that pretty much absolves you of everything ever? If you wanted me to tell everyone you died I'd do it. No lie too white_

I send him a gif of Nathan Fillion about to say something, looking confused, and then plopping his chin in his hand to rethink his life choices.

 _I'm already packed,_ he says.

…

...

 _Michelle Jones_

…

...

My parents sit down across from Shawn and I.

"We wanted to be able to tell you, like this, as a family," Mom says hesitantly.

Shawn takes my hand, and I interlock my fingers with his. Whenever they try to start conversations this way, it isn't good.

"We've been able to secure you passage off planet," Dad says carefully. "To Xandar. Someday we'll follow - but - we could only get one. So. It was an opportunity we could not pass up."

My grip tightens on Shawn's hand. I'm sure I'm hurting him, but I can't help it.

"I can't leave you," I say hoarsely. "You know I can't."

From the hardness in my parents eyes, I can see this is already a losing battle.

Well, I'm a fighter, too.

"Oh yes, you can," Mom answers. "This isn't us asking permission. This is us telling you what is going to happen."

"You can't… you can't force me."

"You're still seventeen. A minor. And we're getting you off this planet."

"Once in a lifetime opportunity," Dad says sadly. "It won't happen again. Not for free."

"Free?" I blurt.

Mom gives Dad a look, like, he wasn't supposed to say anything.

"Someone gave you a ticket, didn't they," I infer, angrily, heatedly, and then I pause. Mulling it over. "It was May Parker, wasn't it? She gave you Ben Parker's ticket."

I feel Shawn go utterly still beside me, like he turned to a corpse in my lethal clutch.

"Yes," Dad admits. "You're leaving next week. After graduation. You and Ned Leeds will be traveling together."

My mouth drops open, and I look at them, and at Shawn's white face, and back again. "And you thought telling me in front of my _boyfriend_ was a nice idea?"

"Better you hear it from us," Mom says kindly. "Shawn, you are a sweetheart, and we love you. You had a right to hear it from us. You can hate us if you want to. But this is our daughter and we'll do anything for her. I'm sorry this will separate you - for now. I'm sure your own parents will also be looking at getting you off planet. _All_ parents are."

Shawn doesn't respond. He can't. He's become a ghost.

"You can't do this," I say firmly, and I feel my face grow hot. This is _embarrassing._ Ordering me around like I'm a child on a train to get out of a bomb-blasted London. This isn't just a safety issue. This is them trying to determine what the rest of my life looks like.

My life is here.

My life…

 _My friends,_ I think. _My friends are leaving. I'll be alone._

I look at Shawn, unable to conceal the horrified expression on my face.

He doesn't even look at me.

"We are doing this," Dad says firmly. "I don't think you quite understand our position. We live in a low-income shit hole. We can't afford to keep pumping artificial clean air into this thing. Taking care of _you_ is our number one priority, no matter what the consequence." His gaze hardens. "No matter what is required of me. Even if it makes you hate us."

"So _noble_ , Dad, but…"

"You cut that shit out," Dad snaps. "You can pull this attitude with your friends, not us. The sarcasm is done. It's dead. And you will be too if you stay here longer. How long do you think you have? A decade or so? You've got months, Michelle. _Months_ of sustainability."

"So I'll move north. They still have schools open. You know I've always wanted to work here. Find clean air solutions. There's internships open with Google sending young ambassadors back and forth to Earth, Xandar, and Asgard… it's not like I'd be stuck here forever. But you can't choose my life for me. Isn't that the point of graduating high school? I get to make _some_ choices."

"No," Dad says. His voice dark, even dangerous. "The answer is _no._ You leave next week. End of discussion. You will be traveling and living with the Parkers on Xandar until your mother and I can afford one of the lotteries to get their ourselves."

"I can't just go live on another planet. You sound like an insane person."

"You're the insane one," Mom suddenly interjects. "You are being offered a chance to have a life and you're spitting in our faces. You're ungrateful and immature. Too immature to understand what we're doing for you - that it kills us to let you go, but we'd do anything to save you, and we'll do it anyway."

"I think I should go," Shawn whispers.

I tug his hand back. "Wait, Shawn, please."

He forcibly pulls his hand out of mine. "I'm going."

"Shawn," I say, jumping to my feet to trail after him out of the dining room. "Shawn wait… we're not going to Nicholas Sparks this shit. Let's _talk._ "

Shawn stops at the apartment door, opens it, and steps out onto the open-air balcony, looking down to a steep drop and the freeway below. "So," he says firmly, "Talk."

I shut the apartment door behind us.

"Off planet, huh?" he asks sadly.

"They're being _assholes."_

"The Parkers," he says, reaching up and tucking a stray curl behind my ear. "They're all about saving your life, huh?"

"I don't need to be _saved._ I can take care of myself."

Shawn shakes his head. "You always do."

...

…

 _Ned Leeds_

…

...

My phone rings. MJ is calling?

Confused, I answer, and keep it cheerful. "Holla."

"Ned," she greets.

"What's up?"

"You busy?"

I glance at the old dvd of _Willow_ in my hand, and the open player in front of me.

"Not _especially."_ I glance at the clock. It's late, like, late for a call from her. Nearly ten p.m. "What's up?"

"My parents just told me."

" _Oh,"_ I exclaim. "Okay! Cool! So you're cool, right? You excited? Are you coming? You ARE coming, right?"

"Slow down. Yes. I'm coming." I hear her curse away from the phone, and something shuffling, and then falling.

"Everything… okay?"

"Sure. Everything's _great."_ MJ sounds a little breathless. Like she's been walking for awhile. "I called Peter too. He didn't answer. Then he texted me some bullshit about missing the graduation ceremony and leaving for the spaceport early. And like, how you and I will meet him there in a week."

"Um, yeah," I say. "It's true."

"It's fucking true? You mean he's not just bailing and hiding out at your place to screw around for a week?"

"No. It's true." My voice cracks on _true._

"You're hiding something from me, Ned Leeds," Michelle says darkly.

"No… I'm not."

"Yes, you are. And I'm going to find out what it is."

She hangs up on me.

I heave a huge sigh. _Okay._ Guy in the chair on duty.

There's a huge, pounding knock on the front door, so loud that the door practically shakes on its hinges and stuff rattles nearby. I jump nearly out of my skin.

I walk over to the door, cautiously. My parents are not home tonight, they're on a three hour roadtrip to the nearest green dome for fresh vegetables. They wouldn't knock, and they shouldn't be back till later.

I try to look through the peephole but I don't see anyone, it's too dark. _Shit._

I pull the curtain aside beside the door ever-so-slightly, barely enough to peer through with one eye.

There's an eyeball glaring right back.

"HOLY SHIT!" I stumble back and nearly fall on my butt.

"Let me IN, NED LEEDS," shouts MJ from the porch. "I know you're in there. I just saw you."

"Good grief," I groan, unlocking the door and pulling it open. MJ blasts past me, pacing around my living room, looking around as if she lost something. She drops a large duffel bag on the ground, and a backpack from her shoulders.

She leaves them there, and then goes into the small kitchen and starts looking in cupboards and drawers.

"Uh, hi, MJ," I say cheerfully. "What's up?"

"Do your parents have an alcohol stash?"

"Um, yeah. But they weigh the bottles every time they pull them out to see if I snuck any."

MJ's eyes focus on me as if she hasn't noticed me there before. "Seriously?"

"Yeah. They said it's to keep me accountable."

"No offense, Ned. You parents are sweet, but that's batshit crazy." She glares at my kitchen, before sitting with a huff at the tiny dinette table sticking out of the wall.

"Um, is everything okay?" I ask. "We were literally just… just talking."

"I know. I was outside already. I knocked over a potted plant."

An awkward pause.

"So… why did you call?" I ask.

"I hadn't made my mind up yet if I was coming in." MJ gives me a hopeful look. "Can I stay on your couch tonight?"

I look at my crummy apartment, wondering what my parents would think when they got home and found MJ asleep on the couch. They'd probably not be mad at her at all, but then they'd corner me later and ask me if I was still a virgin.

"Is there something wrong?" I ask, instead of answering. I sit at the table across from her, the chair creaking loudly in her silence. "You know you can tell me… if you want."

She appears to lose some of her antagonism, those hard edges. She rests her chin in her hand and gives me a side eye. "You want to girl talk? With me? You'd be willing to do that?"

The microwave dings.

"I already have the popcorn ready," I declare.

…

...

 _Tony Stark_

…

...

I lift my head wearily. That's two in one day. Huh.

I'm suspended in the same blue energy that I used to hold the infinity stone steady. Loki fiddled with the machines, got them working again. They didn't fall when the room caved in, they were close enough to the edge of the floor still standing.

I feel hot, red blood trickling in my suit. Friday tries to read off vitals, her voice muffled and changing like a radio station that just can't tune in properly.

My hands are trapped in fists on either side of me, my legs stuck too.

Like a butterfly pinned to paper. Wonderful.

Loki paces in front of me, looking through the watery blue energy at me. "Welcome back," he says thinly, his high voice veiled in polite indifference.

I try to pull my arms loose. "It's over, Loki. Whatever you think you could accomplish here. It's done. It's not working."

"I am not _done,_ Anthony Stark," Loki leans forward, a devilish grin on his face. "I am far from done."

...

* * *

 **...**

* * *

 **NEXT:** Heading out of the New York harbor on the Arc should be simple enough; but we all know that nothing is ever that simple, especially with Peter Parker involved.

* * *

 **PERSONAL REVIEW REPLIES**

lone ranger22 - Thank you so much for your kind review! I love that you are enjoying this!

LunaScamander17 - Sporadically, I'm afraid. But as often as I can. Thank you SO much for your reviews!

ODXT - What incredibly kind words, thank you SO MUCH!

The Muse's Summer House - Oh my goodness, no need to apologize. What beautifully kind words you have shared with me. I am so happy that you're enjoying my lil' book! Thank you!

purpleflame2 - No kidding LOL

EleanorGardner - Ah, yes! And now that I'm finally finished with Where They Go I will be able to focus more on this one. I am stoked you're enjoying this.

LoonyLovegood1981 - thank you so much for such a long and thoughtful review! It feeds my soul! And yes it's TOTALLY like a horcrux! Love it.

TheScottishLegend - LOL yes totally. Thank you so much for reviewing!

cargumentluv - thank you so much for your review! you're awesome!

Tightpants182 - You pretty much got it, but there's gonna be a lot of character switching and cross over when it comes to "who represents who" so like, sometimes MJ and Ned will be Merry and Pippin, and sometimes one of them is Sam, sometimes the older Avenger characters will be various kings and wizards and ents and then switch places :)

* * *

 **Other Marvel Stories**

* * *

Avenge the Departed - Finally posted the FINALE, the last chapter for my crime/undercover thriller starring Peter Parker, Deadpool, Tony Stark, Bucky Barnes and Captain America!

The Departed - a repost of the above story in a different Avengers category to try and reach more audiences!

The Vast Marvel - collection of Marvel one shots! I suggest adding this story to an "alert" for when I post short drabbles!

Deadpool is Pissed - humorous one shot featuring Deadpool, Peter Parker, and Korg!

Down Came the Rain - my first fully fledged Spider-Man fic, starring other Avengers as well. Peter is kidnapped by a rogue NYPD cop, tortured for information on the Avengers, and released. He copes badly with the psychological aftermath. Interlude book between Spider-Man: Homecoming and Infinity War. Told in flash backs and flash forwards like 13 Reasons Why.

Down Came the Rain Retold - a repost of the above fic, and may I say, the far superior version. Told chronologically, scenes are added and expanded, plot holes and timelines fixed, characterization added... easier to read, track with. Plot and character growth is more obvious.

Sakaar and Away - not posted yet, but keep an eye out for this one. Peter and Aunt May are captured by the Grandmaster, and Peter will do whatever it takes to survive Sakaar, rescue Aunt May, and get home! (Another AU) Add me to your author alerts to get an email when I post this *NEW* story!

That One Time Peter Parker Accidentally Did Cocaine - yup, based on another crazy dream I had. One shot. Title is exactly how it sounds haha. Peter does drugs, and his totally (alive!) Dad is not happy about it - for more reasons than one. Tony Stark is even worse.


	4. Into the Darkness

...

* * *

...

 **Four - Into the Darkness**

…

* * *

...

...

 _Peter Parker_

…

...

I stare with trepidation at my phone. Aunt May leans her head against the post behind our bench, shutting her eyes and trying to doze.

In a public space like this, that's close to impossible. We're two of hundreds, sitting, sleeping, or milling around the public lobby area, which is what's left of a huge shipping warehouse with long hard benches set in rows throughout. The place to wait until the Arc departs in the morning, four a.m. sharp. We don't have much longer to wait. There have been noises on the docks for the last ten minutes - barriers being laid out to guide the crowds, security, a ramp being lowered from the Ark…

Aunt May's phone beeps, and she blinks herself awake to look at it. After a moment, she taps out a quick response, shuts it off, and puts it back in her pocket with a sigh.

I'm still staring at my screen.

"I'd save your battery, if I were you," Aunt May says tiredly. "Maybe there's no outlets for our chargers in space."

"Ha ha," I reply wryly. "I'll stop texting when you stop texting."

"I'll have you know, I'm having a very important conversation with your aunt."

"You're my aunt."

"I mean Sharon."

"Oh. Is she going to come say goodbye?"

"Oh, even better. She's going to Wakanda. I think we were the only reason she stayed in New York, anyway." Aunt May shrugs, and I feel an uncomfortable twinge in my gut. I already figured why she was staying in New York. Old guilt, old vows.

"Uh huh," I say lightly. "That's… that's good. I'd feel really bad for not saying goodbye otherwise. But… I mean, it's an emergency."

Silence falls again.

" _What_ is causing that worried wrinkle in your forehead?" she exclaims. "We're leaving early. Just like we needed to. And no sign of pursuit."

"It's just… I texted MJ and she didn't text back. _Much."_

Her eyes widen. "Oh? What'd she say?"

Shamefacedly, I hand my phone to her.

 _Hey MJ, just wanted to let you know, I have to leave a little early. Heading for the spaceport now. I'm going to miss graduation._

Her reply; _What the actual FUCK Peter? You're just going to go without saying goodbye?! That's fucked up. Have fun with your new life in Xandar. Send me a postcard._

Ten minutes later, I was agonizing over a reply. I didn't know how to say it wasn't actually goodbye, I assumed (mistakenly) that her parents had told her already.

I finally started to type out a brief, but entirely vague apology, when an ellipsis appears on her end, so I waited.

 _Just had a chat with my parents,_ she says.

 _Oh?_

 _I guess it's not goodbye after all. See you in Wakanda._

 _I wasn't sure… if you knew. Are you okay with that? Are YOU okay?_

 _Nope._

 _Wana talk about it?_

 _Nope._

Aunt May hands my phone back to me. "She's about to leave everything she's ever known behind. All her dreams, career aspirations. Her parents."

"Her boyfriend," I add.

She reaches over and gently pushes some of my hair back from my forehead. "This is going to be so hard for her. She's probably really hurting right now." She looks away. "And as much as Ned will pretend this is everything he's ever wanted, he'll have an adjustment period too. We're all going to feel a little homesick for awhile."

My phone buzzes again.

"Save that battery," Aunt May intones.

I give it a glance. "Holy shit, it's Tony Stark again." I open the texts and read with growing confusion.

 _Call me when you get to the rendezvous point._

 _...We'll make sure you're well-protected._

My last conversation with Tony Stark implied that someone was listening in. Probably Loki. Or maybe someone worse? Maybe he didn't come alone. Maybe… too many _maybes._

Why text me, to ask me to bypass texting and call him? Calling means a signal can be tracked. Even text messages probably aren't all that safe. Still…

Tony Stark already knows where I'm going. I'm going to Wakanda. He _specifically_ refused to say Wakanda on the phone. Kept saying Black Cat coffee instead, which clearly meant T'Challa's panther alter-ego.

This person texting with Tony Stark's phone doesn't know where we're going. Hence _rendezvous point._

I text back with a wince. _I'm sorry, Tony,_ I think, and I hit send.

…

...

 _Tony Stark_

...

...

It's all too amusing watching a god fiddling with something as mundane as a cellphone. Especially when he takes too long and it goes back to the lock screen.

"You're going to need to let me look at it," I say from my stuck position.

"And trust that you would not warn this _Underoos_ person?" Loki snaps at me, having dropped the guise of Scott Lang. "You must think me truly foolish to believe I'd fall for such a thing."

"It's not going to just unlock itself because you threaten it."

He swipes at the screen erratically. "Confound this idiotic Midgardian device!"

"It's facial recognition, Truly Foolish," I sigh. "Hold the damn phone up to my face."

Loki holds up the phone briefly, and the screen returns to his half-assed text. He quickly types out a second part.

"What are you saying to him?" I ask suspiciously.

Loki holds the phone up, smiling. He's showing off.

 _...We'll make sure you're well protected._

I feel my abdomen twinge. The pain of the scepter plunging just beneath my ribs, through my back - maybe through the spleen, I can't be sure - is bad enough. The only thing keeping me from bleeding out is the suspension hold. World's best compression. Holding infinity stones and my internal organs. Just peachy.

Though the pain of wondering if Peter is going to fall for this trick is worse.

Loki might not know who _Underoos_ is, but he overheard me and found the contact in my phone quickly enough. If only I had realized it wasn't Scott Lang five seconds earlier. I should have just stayed silent and trusted the kid to run as far and as fast as he could.

A text pops up in reply from Peter.

 _The real Tony Stark already knows where to find me._

I smile. _Atta boy._

Loki lets out a huff of annoyance and chucks my phone across the room. I listen to it shatter against the wall.

"So, where were we?" I ask. "You were telling me where you stashed Scott Lang."

"I didn't do anything with your friend," Loki growls. "I hit him, and he vanished. Ran away like a _cowardly_ flesh-monger."

"What a shame," I quip lightly, my body throbbing with pain. _Need medical attention… at some point… preferably soon._

 _I'm late for my date with Ms. Potts._

Scott Lang is probably the size of broken pencil lead, and lying somewhere unconscious in this room. I guess I can hold out till he wakes up. I can only hope he stays tiny after he wakes up. Maybe crawls into Loki's ear canal before he presses the bigger-trigger.

"There are plenty of popular ports of entry to and from this hideous Midgardian city," Loki sighs, more to himself, than to me. "One your underoos _spy_ will likely try and use to flee from my circle of influence. But do not fear, Anthony Stark. We shall examine each and every one."

I hesitate on my next question, knowing full well he won't answer. "We?"

...

…

 _Peter Parker_

...

...

I finally doze off.

But I dream about Uncle Ben in the coroner's office. His body on the stretcher, the lights cold and the fluorescence nearly green in their sickly hue.

I dream about how I sat on the small chair two halls over, a shock blanket wrapped around me. Shaking like a leaf. How they didn't know that my super-hearing allowed me to hear Sharon Carter's reaction when she saw her dead partner.

I remember she didn't ask how it happened. She didn't ask who did it. She didn't ask about me. And she didn't even cry out for Ben, her dead partner.

All she could think about was May. I know this because I could hear her screaming.

 _How can I tell her? I can't do it. I can't. I can't tell her. Oh god. Oh god, May. I have to tell May. I can't do it. May. I can't do this. I can't do this. I can't do this…_

And then she screamed again, that ragged, awful sound, deep in her throat. That panic and grief lacing together at once like a biological weapon spreading through the atmosphere. Collapsing to her knees next to his body and putting a pale hand over his eyes.

 _I'll take care of them for as long as I can,_ she had growled darkly, into his dead ears. Her voice sounded like fifty years of smoking habits, barely human, at this point. _You have my word, Benjamin Parker. I'll watch over them. Even if they never leave this planet. I won't leave them. I'll take care of them._

She screams again, and I feel my eyes pop open.

There's another scream.

And I'm not dreaming.

"Peter," I hear Aunt May call out urgently. Instantly I'm awake, standing, and leaping over the back of the bench were sitting on, standing upwards on the bench behind it. "Peter!" Aunt May repeats, with a hiss. "Get down from there!"

The crowd is restless, people starting to turn, some panicking, running towards the outdoor platforms, or ducking behind benches.

Over the heads, I see a tall, thin figure. Definitely alien, wraith-like in appearance, with lavender-blue skin and no nose - sort of like Voldemort. He has long, white hair trailing from the back of his scalp, a dark armored space-suit, and elongated fingers nothing short of a _nosferatu_ nightmare.

He's floating three feet off the ground, fingertips pressed together like a cathedral steeple. His eyes glint.

"My greetings and salutations to you, burdens of Midgard," he says in a wispy, sickly tone, accented and alien. "You are blessed by the presence of the children of Thanos, servants of our fallen lord - long may his spirit linger. And rise again on the shoulders of those who wait and give their blood for him."

There's a stirring of murmurs and cries of panic throughout the waiting station.

"I am searching for the warrior they call _Underoos,"_ the alien says calmly. "Should any of you know where this warrior hides, bring him forth - and you will be granted our mercy."

 _Oh SHIT._

Another alien suddenly appears at the left, a tall, hulking figure in broad-shouldered armor of brassy, smudged colors, probably closer to seven-feet tall and three hundred pounds. He has lizard-like skin, and an underbite like an ogre from a fairy tale.

He holds some sort of overly large, axe-like weapon in his beefy hands, slamming it into his palm and causing sparks to fly. He lets out a closed-mouth roar, in a sort of sickly hum of bloodlust. Several near him scramble to get out of his way, flinching, some crying out in fear - but he doesn't pursue any of them, only smiles at them, predatory and patient.

"Aunt May," I bend down and whisper over the back of the bench to her. "Get down and hide under here. Don't move, don't speak, pull our bags up and try to cover yourself as best you can…"

"Do you _know_ who these guys _are?"_ May hisses. "They said _Thanos…"_

"They're after me," I whisper. "It's me. Just get down. Do it now."

"Peter!"

"Now," I repeat urgently. I turn jump from the bench, starting to push my way through the crowd - many of them now frozen in fear, watching the two aliens - who are conveniently blocking two of the main exits to parking and the road.

No one notices my small form slip to the public restroom doors, thankfully located around a cinder block corner and partially obscured by a vending machine. Which, to Aunt May's disappointment earlier when I offered to get her something cold for her hand, was empty of everything except three bags of expired trail mix.

I slip into the bathroom, and pull back my sleeve to look at the highly condensed gift from Tony Stark. My graduation present.

I press the metallic button, seamless in it's hiding place, and practically yelp with surprise at the speed which the Iron Spider suit unfolds across my body. With metallic clinks and hisses, it molds perfectly to myself, and even has way more flexibility and movement than the old suit - which admittedly, is packed in my duffel bag, too.

When the mask slams shut over my face and the lights blink on, the radar and stats appear in the corners of my vision as if my viewpoint is now a highly-detailed video game.

Then I open the bathroom door.

"Ey, uh," calls out one thick New Yorker, filling an extra-large purple windbreaker jacket and addressing the station with a thick Bronx accent. "Any one'a ya's some guy they callin' underoos?" He looks like he runs into aliens every day, he's so casual about it. "Just com'on out so these ugly bastards can phone home!"

"Who the hell has a name like that?" another voice calls out. "Wasn't that like, underwear?"

"Screw you alien bastards! I'll call the police, and they can call the Avengers!" a man in a business suit and carrying a briefcase and turns and runs at a full sprint. "Get out of the way! OUT OF THE WAY!" He flies past me at the bathroom door, and continues to knock people over and leap over baggage.

The floating alien, malice radiating from him in waves, looks across the crowd.

"Cowards run for two reasons," he calls out. "First - to absolve themselves of involvement and responsibility to assist their superiors. Or second, shame. Shame of truth, that they _are_ the guilty party. Or maybe they hide them."

I feel his voice right inside my head, like somehow it's projected from his throat and slapping my skull in a throbbing heartbeat.

The man with the briefcase disappears out of the door down to the docks that several other people had fled through earlier.

"Y'know," I say loudly, stepping into the alien's gaze head-on. "It might be easier to find this underoos guy if you spent more time _looking_ and less time flapping your overly chapped lips."

His eyes grow dark with zealous hunger, critically observing my suit. I wonder if I detect a hint of surprise.

" _Can_ I recommend two things," I continue. "...uh - chapstick? And maybe putting his face on a milk carton?"

Suddenly there is a shriek of pain, and horrible gurgling sound.

A third alien steps into the back of the warehouse, dressed in feminine armor. A half-mask, half-helmet partially obscures the top half of her pale gray, slightly bluish-skinned face, but does nothing to hide the appearance of long, dark blue hair, and demonic eyes.

Then I realize - it's not a helmet. They're horns.

She's carrying a huge, three-pronged spear, and pierced at the end of it, is the man in the suit, his briefcase clattering to the floor.

"This is what happens when you try to run," she snarls out, jerking her spear back and watching with satisfaction as the bloodied man topples to the floor. His head rolls back, a gurgle at his throat again, and blood pools out in a huge puddle around him. His abdomen looks like it's been torn right through.

"None of these people will run from you!" I cry out loudly, holding my hands out. "Don't hurt _anyone_ else! You're looking for underoos, right? You'll have to get through me first! I'm the one you need to worry about! These people don't know anything!"

"YEAH SPIDER-MAN," calls out someone from the crowd.

"You tell 'em!"

"Hell yeah, Spider-Man!"

Someone is applauding, and someone whistles like they're at a baseball game.

Well, at least the crowd is feeling confident enough in my abilities to save them from these ridiculous-looking characters - while a man breathes his last in a pile of his own blood on the floor, and it's three against one.

Me? I have zero confidence. _Nothing._

"Come on, Voldemort!" I shout. "Do something!"

"That can be arranged," he replies placidly, "And I am named Maw. Ebony Maw."

He clearly expects a reaction of pain, fear, maybe groveling and screaming.

The entire warehouse bursts into laughter.

His mouth grinds confusedly, and his cheek twitches with only a pure, unfathomable rage that comes from being mocked when you believe yourself to be a god. He holds out his hands in a weird, conductor motion, and suddenly pieces of the metal walls peel away from their steel supports, flying across the room for me.

People start to finally flee in compulsive waves, screaming and trying to move out of the way. I leap straight off the ground, catching one of the many exposed pipes criss-crossing across the warehouse ceiling. I crouch on top of one, using my web shooters to catch each flying piece with a _thwp_ of web, swinging them in the opposite direction towards Ebony Maw instead.

I barely have time to see if they connect before my spider-sense _zings_ and I fly off the pipe, jumping out of the way just in time for a spear to embed itself right through the metal. A loud, shrieking hiss of hot air begins to fly out of the hole in the metal. I barrel in a under-arc, attached to the end of a web, swinging up into the chin of the nasty, ogre-hulk, clocking his head back in a snapping motion.

I'd thought it would at least knock him down, but it doesn't - his massive arms swing towards me, growling incoherently, and I manage to skip up his body the rest of the way, leap off the back of his shoulders, and catch a spear right in the ribs.

I twisted with just enough time to make the point glance off, enough to bruise but not pierce, as the spear clatters to the floor and the blue-haired alien snatches it up again, reaching for me as I fall away from her.

Suddenly there's pieces of the building surrounding me, moved by the telekinesis powers of Ebony Maw, trapping me on the floor where I've fallen - there's pieces of metal curling like tinfoil around my wrists, jerking me down, chunks of cement peeling out of the floor and crunching down on my feet to keep me from kicking off.

I press my fingers to my palms, firing off webs in huge, sticky parcels against the walls, leaning in, the huge chunks bearing down on me - squeezing me alive - literally about to squeeze me till I pop like balloon -

The timed web-grenades start to explode.

 _BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!_

One of the chunks of cement gets thrown far enough that Ebony Maw actually has to make some effort to slide out of the way, his floating looking a little more _hurried_ than he wants to be. His lips curl with annoyance.

I scramble out of the debri-trap and get my feet knocked out from under me immediately by the lizard-armor guy, who slams a fist down into my body, driving me so deep that the cement floor cracks beneath me -

I shoot web up into his face, sealing off his mouth and nose. I shoot off a few of the timed grenade webs, just the girl-alien yanks me away from her lizard partner, throws me down into the floor again, jarring me so hard that I feel as if my spine is cracking and my vision sees nothing but bursting stars and black specks forming over the shadows of the aliens.

The lizard guy starts to claw at his face, but the web sticks to his hands, too. The grenades start to go off, knocking his massive body this way and that, like an invisible wrestling move is knocking him back onto the floor. The blackened soot on his armor and skin sear and bubble with the force of the explosions, and the web can't be pulled from his face - I can hear his breathing stop, cut short by the web sealing off his nostrils and mouth.

He's suffocating.

I feel like my body is getting torn in half - the suit can only deflect so much of the abuse. I'm flailed entirely up in the air and tossed like a ragdoll, the blue-alien tossing me to Ebony Maw, who then proceeds to fling me around like a cat hitting a feather on a string.

 _I'm in trouble,_ I realize. I need back up. He's going to kill me if I can't get past the telekinesis somehow -

I start firing off pieces of web in every which way, strings flying here and there, catching walls, the cement barriers, the pipes in the ceiling, everything. One of them even hits the blue-girl and Maw both, snagging onto their clothes - so when Maw flings me again, my weight drags them both along with me, finally knocking them off their balance. The blue one falls face first, Maw slides into one of the walls, hitting it _hard_ with one shoulder and gasping in shock at actually coming into contact with anything physically.

"Thanos will have his…" he starts, but another piece of web smacks him in the face, covering his mouth. Despite not having a nose, I'm sure he can breathe some other way, because this doesn't seem to bother him as much as the lizard guy -

Who lies on the floor, not breathing. If he's not dead he will be soon.

Maw's eyes grow huge with indignation, unable to monologue about his Lord and Master must be really frustrating for an extremist. His hands wind through the air like he's casting a magic spell in an old, cheesy movie.

One of the pipes from the ceiling twirls around like a string, disobeying every law of physics, and suddenly curls up around my neck and beginning to cinch tight -

I spy the blue haired alien female smiling sickeningly at me, and then she springs away and disappears from my view.

I'm going to choke to death -

My breath starts coming in and out with horrified gasps, rasping and wheezing and cutting off closer, closer, shorter - shorter - my eyes water, my brain backfires into pure panic, he's manipulating things - the air - around me to hold me completely still and compliant.

 _BANG!_

A gunshot.

There's a bloody hole through Ebony Maw's forehead, and a trickle of something purple and green oozing down his face. He goes a little cross-eyed, and slumps to the ground, no longer floating, kneeling in an absolute daze. Aunt May is standing behind him with a shaking pair of hands grasped around the handgun she's been pretending to _not_ have.

The pipe loosens from my neck.

I take a deep, lung-shattering inhale and fall to the ground, tumbling out of the webs of my own making and detaching from them with a simple command to the suit to stop responding to their level of stickiness.

I roll away and rake in huge breaths, gasping and heaving. Eyes watering and throat probably turning dark purple with bruises already, I push myself to my feet and stumble towards Ebony Maw, firing web around his arms, body, legs, turning him into a giant cocoon - the way real spiders wrap up a fly before eating them for dinner.

I look at May. "Run," I try to say, but no sound comes out. "RUN," I repeat, and a tiny little _squeak_ pops out. But she can read lips.

She lowers the gun and shakes her head.

"NOW," I whisper hoarsely. "The Ark."

She puts the safety on, presses the gun carefully down by her leg, the nozzle to the floor, and slips away like a fleeting orb of light into darkness. I see her duck behind the bench where we hid before. She starts loading up our bags onto the small trolley again, and pushes it out of the warehouse exit. I can hear panicked voices and screams outside, now that my hearing is slowly coming back, too - chants and calls for the Ark ramp to be opened for access early. I can hear security and cops, and more approaching sirens for emergency services.

Alarms wail long and deep into the night.

Now the warehouse is empty except for me, Maw, and the dead one.

"Where's your friend?" I say hoarsely, looking at Maw with hatred burning in my chest. I can't remember ever loathing something so much before.

"Proxima," he responds, muffled, the web not so fully cutting off his ability to use his voice. "Do not fret. She will soon lead you to your doom."

"Why are you after Underoos?" I ask darkly. "If you tell me, I might let you live."

He laughs sullenly. "You think death frightens me?"

"You might fear the pain it takes to get there," I snarl. "I can make this last."

"Tsk, tsk," Maw sighs. Matter from his head drips down into his eyes, and into the web. He's been shot in the head and yet he's still kicking it. Something a little more devastating will need to be used for him. "So quickly you judge. Why not listen to my proposal?"

"I'm DONE listening," I say, and I fire another web grenade. This one lodges right beneath his head, onto his throat. I fire two more, one sticks to his chest, the other his abdomen.

I turn and rush quickly away, ducking away from the explosion that rocks the already-obliterated end of the warehouse. This time, webs catch, and so does something dripping out of one of the pipes. There's a huge blossom of fire and hot air, pushing me with a yelp back onto the floor beside the dead alien in the armor. His face is considerably less green-and-gold, eyes wide in his last moments without air.

I shudder with the thought of taking someone's life - _anyone's_ life - and run for the exit on the opposite side of the building that May fled from with the trolley of bags. Just before I fly through the door, I hit the button at my wrist.

The suit begins to fold, condense, and whir back into a small, feasible shape - nothing more than a small, metallic bracelet around my wrist.

My feet hit the ground running in that frigid, early morning air. I hear the sirens and a foghorn blaring out into the harbor. I rush around the corner of the building where the barriers are set up - there's cops, firemen, and beyond them, crowds getting ushered gently onto the Ark.

So they decided to open up the ramp early after all.

Security is roaming with flashlights, everyone is distracted. I can hear the cops shouting. _Dead one inside,_ they are yelling. _Any others?_

 _Dead ONE_ , my brain repeats. If Ebony Maw can survive getting shot in the back of the head, maybe he can survive a fireball building. The dead one was the choking lizard one.

I'm able to slip into the same crowd of refugees, until I find a cluster of thirty or so people standing near where the cement drops off to the wooden barrier, and beyond that, the black waters slapping the undersides of the docks and smelling of that cold, green deep.

May is sitting on our luggage, clutching her messenger bag in her hands, eyes roaming with fearful dread over every face shuffling by her to the ramp.

"May," I call out, but my voice cannot rise above a whisper. I can't spare her even these few seconds of worry, I have to wait till I'm beside her, carefully leaning over and tapping her shoulder.

She leaps to her feet, whirling around and throwing her arms around me. She starts crying.

"You saved me," I whisper, but nothing comes out. She pushes back and looks in my eyes, pushing my hair back, looking at my head, my neck, checking my arms and shoulders.

"I'm _fine,"_ I insist hoarsely. "You saved me."

Then I'm dropping to my knees with such a sudden onslaught of pain and exhaustion, I crash haphazardly against our luggage and nearly kick the backside of another family huddled just a little too close.

"Is he okay?" one of them says - a woman, I think. "Wait - was he still in the _building?_ I'll run over and grab an EMT!"

"No, no, he's - uh - he gets faint, um, when there's too much, stimulation and noise," Aunt May lies through her teeth, collapsing beside me and throwing her arms around me again.

"I got you, you're okay," she whispers. "Tell me what to do. I _can_ get an EMT."

"Are you SURE he's okay?" pushes the other woman.

"Ma'am, with all due respect, give me a god-damn moment," Aunt May snaps in her direction. Then she blinks with shock at herself. "I'm sorry. I didn't - that's not how I usually - my apologies. Just please give us a moment."

The woman seems all too happy to give Aunt May her space.

"I'm fine," I whisper. "I just hurt all over. Give me an hour or two and the bruises'll start to clear up."

"You know I can't _really_ tell what you're saying," she shakes her head. "Oh, god, Peter, your poor neck. It's dark purple."

I push myself back against May's suitcase and take a deep, painful breath. "It's okay," I whisper. "I'm okay." I coax out a smile. "You _saved_ me. You shot him in the head."

She shrugs. "No one hurts my boy. No one."

My spider-sense lets out a jolt of warning, and I pull Aunt May down beside me on the ground and twist to cover her body with mine.

The warehouse lets off another explosion, this time pieces of the metal-plated roof come flying off. While a lot of them fall on the opposite side, there's a huge onslaught of really hot air, and now the flames that were just inside are pouring out of any openings it has.

I quickly roll away and pull May to her feet, hooking one arm around her to guide her the other direction, pushing the trolley with one hand.

"We're getting on that Ark," I whisper.

I can see my knuckles on the trolley handle now, dark blue and bloody. My throat feels like it's been crushed, the worst laryngitis I've ever felt. My back burns with a heat beyond fire and explosions, the type of fire inside muscles pushed just beyond that breaking point.

It's probably going to take me all night to get back to feeling myself again.

"Let me push this," Aunt May insists. "Come on. It's okay, sweetheart. You don't heal instantaneously."

I sigh and relinquish control of the trolley. "Okay." I reach down to the trolley and pull one of my thicker winter jackets out of the pillowcase I had thrown it in, slowly pushing my arms into the sleeves and groaning a little too loudly at the stretch of muscles to do so. I zip it up as high is it can go, and pull up the hood to hide the bruises on my neck.

May finishes pushing the trolley up past the barrier, stopping at the security checkpoint.

"Be sure to get the kid checked in with the nurse," says the security guard.

"Of course," May nods responsibly. "First thing."

He checks our Ark passes and waves us forward. We wait in the cold, shivering and huddled together until they've finished checking our bags. The old suit is hidden in a sewn liner in my suitcase without a zipper, and I notice Aunt May is sweating despite the chilled temperature, holding her jacket shut in a peculiar way. Oh god, she put the gun _on_ her person instead of just using my hidden pocket.

This trip so far is a disaster. And we haven't even _left_ New York yet.

What else could _possibly_ happen?

...

* * *

...

* * *

 **NEXT:** Peter Parker and his Aunt May flee everything they've ever known, sailing across the Atlantic on the Ark. Destination: Wakanda.

* * *

 **Special thanks to the beta, the besta, the Crystal. QueenofCrystallopia. She is literally the greatest. Be sure to check out her work, you can click on her profile from my Favorites section!**

* * *

 **Personal Review Replies**

cargumentluv - Thank you SO much! So glad you are enjoying this!

Black' Victor Cachat - thank you so much for your review, I do hope you enjoyed my chapter! I am not sure we've crossed paths before in this fandom, so welcome! :)

EleanorGardner - You're so spot on for a lot of these lol. I think some of them may also be surprising, and some of them will switch around. Ironically I totally didn't think about Shield being like the elves but you're SO right - Shield heading out to join SWORD in space, just like the elves heading for the gray havens! What a great interpretation, you are awesome! Thanks so much for your reviews :)

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Tightpants182 - HAHA omg you crack me up! Yeah there's a bit of devastation approaching in this book as well, thankfully though not quite as bad as Avenge the Departed as far as the death and bloodshed XD I think this by comparison will be a much happier story! :) Thanks so much for your reviews as always! You're awesome!


	5. Shortcut to Death

...

* * *

 **...**

 **Five - Shortcut to Death**

 **...**

* * *

...

 _Peter Parker_

...

A sound of metallic groaning haunts the gray space where my brain rests in a fitful doze. The engines grind together, and a rhythmic _ch-ch-ch_ begins to throb through the floor under my feet.

Instinctively, I pull my feet up, flinching myself awake.

Aunt May is curled up in a tiny circle on the bench beside me like a kitten, hands closed over her jacket and head resting on her bag, one arm looped through the strap of another one.

"You awake?" I whisper, but she doesn't respond. Good. She just shot an alien in the head - she deserves whatever relaxation she can get.

There's a small porthole window beside me. It's still dark outside, so I lean forward and look at my reflection. My furrowed eyebrows and stressed frown fill the glass.

I pull my jacket apart at the neck and look at the bruises. Definitely fading.

"We leaving?" Aunt May mumbles. Possibly sleep-talking, it's difficult to tell. Her eyes are still shut and she's barely moving her mouth.

"The engines just started," I say.

"Good, remind me to… get the salad," Aunt May whispers. She hugs her bag a little closer.

"Okay, I will. I promise." I unzip my jacket and lay it over her like a blanket. I get up and crack my knuckles, and tilt my head from side to side, trying to dislodge the aches and pains that come with a fight.

It took a few hours to get really settled and relaxed. After going through the haphazard security, we were informed the ark would actually be running late due to the incident in the warehouse. The police wanted to secure the area - and the ark - before we began the trek across the ocean.

I've never been on a real helicarrier before, and honestly I thought it'd be… cooler. But all remnants of SHIELD technology are gone, repurposed for the use of the mass exodus of refugees. Now, it looks almost the exact same as the inside of a ferry going from New York to Jersey shore. Just bigger, and more organized. Class seating like in trains and airplanes.

We're somewhere in the middle. We don't have a private cabin with beds, but we do have private seating with partial walls around our fold-out benches, like a restaurant booth.

I leave our box, number 2A, and maneuver through the other boxes till I'm in an open common area. There's a small kitchen with a metal grate locked over the counter, and a sign that says _We'll be back at 6 AM._ Long tables with bench-seating stretch from one end of the low room to another. The walls and ceiling are that white metal that makes me feel like I'm in an old submarine in a Cold War movies.

I wander aimlessly till I'm out of the other side of the small cafeteria, passing through another sitting area. This one is the less expensive, steerage-ticket sort of area, where the seats look no more comfortable than an old school bus, there's nowhere to store luggage except for by your feet or beside you, and it's more crowded. There's a stink of cigarette smoke in the air.

Suddenly my spider-sense sings ever-so-slightly down my arms, and races up my spine in an enigmatic frost.

 _Someone is watching you._

I turn and look over my shoulder. There's people sleeping, on their phones, playing handheld games, reading books and newspapers. No one is watching me.

I look near the front of the sitting area, and I don't see anyone looking at me there, either. Maybe one of those people are only fake-sleeping. Maybe they shut their eyes whenever I look in their direction.

I shiver slightly, and feel a fluster of movement on my right.

A backpack disappears through a restroom door, and my spider-senses jolt. Whoever is wearing that backpack was the one that was watching me. I'm sure of it.

I walk quietly and quickly up to the unisex bathroom, opening the door with caution, and slipping inside.

The yellowish light is old and flickery, the stalls badly scratched. The floor is worn metal that reflects my footsteps with an echoing _kick, kack, kick, kack._ I glance at the hand dryer and sink on my left, three shut stall doors on my left.

The engines seem louder in here. _Ch-ch-ch._

There's a pair of large sneakers trying to step off the floor and onto the edge of the toilet so that they aren't visible under the stall door. One foot slips with a comedic squeak, back to the floor, and there's a muffled curse.

Using my enhanced strength, I reach over and push open the door with a sudden shove.

Ned lets out a high-pitched scream, which startles a short, hoarse yell out of me, which scares Ned even more, and his scream rises an octave.

"Jesus _Christ_ you're hopeless at hiding!" MJ's voice pops out over head, leaning over the stall walls. She's standing on the toilet in the next stall over, looking down with grim disapproval at Ned and I.

"What - what - are you DOING here?" I gasp, my voice cracking all over the place.

"What am I doing here?" Ned screeches. "What are YOU doing? Do you always bust down the bathroom door when a dude is hiding?!"

"Sometimes, yeah!" I exclaim. "Seriously, what ARE you doing?"

"We're coming with you," MJ says gloomily. "Obviously."

"Why - why NOW? Why not - after - graduation?" I stutter.

"It's just a ceremony," MJ sighs, her head popping down behind the wall. Her stall door opens and she appears behind me. "It doesn't really matter anyway."

"It does so matter!" Ned barks, but quickly sobers. "But. You know. Friends matter more. That's why we're here."

"Please tell me you didn't bail on graduation just because of me," I groan.

"That's exactly why we would bail on graduation!" Ned says. "You needed us! Running for your life! You needed help with the Asgardian Topaz, obviously!"

"Shh," I squeak. "We're keeping the _topaz_ under major wraps."

I wish I could tell them that Loki was after the stone, but I couldn't easily do that right now without explaining to MJ why I am privy to any of this information at all. Which jumps right into a conversation about Spider-Man.

I can feel the buzz of the stone in my pocket, as if the mere hint of it brings it to life. _Shit._

"I can't believe you're here," I repeat. "I mean… it's… so…"

"So what?" MJ asks.

"It's good to see you," I say with considerable relief. "I mean, I can't _believe_ you two would do something - like, like this - but since you're here…"

"Me too," Ned grins, and he gives me a hug.

"Wait," I turn and look and MJ and Ned suspiciously. "What are you doing here? In the bathroom?"

"It was a shortcut," Ned bursts.

"Shortcut?" I repeat. "Shortcut to _what?"_

MJ rolls her eyes. "Shortcut to nothing. We were hiding from you."

"Why - why were you _hiding?_ Are you stowing away?"

"Naw, we're on the up and up," MJ snorts. "We knew if you found us before the ship left the dock, you'd make us get off. We were making a plan to come find you after the engines started."

"And I panicked when I saw you," Ned giggles.

"That - that means you were here earlier? When the - when the things…" I pause. "You got out of the warehouse in time?"

"Dude, no, we weren't anywhere near that," Ned laughs. "We got here and the warehouse was on fire and they were ushering everyone _way_ around it. We got through security oddly fast."

"What happened exactly?" MJ asks. "Someone said there was an alien invasion." She tilts her head. "I don't suppose that's why you look like someone ran _you_ through a paper shredder? Jesus."

I blink. Oh shit. I left my jacket on Aunt May. I'm still bruised. No - Peter Parker is wearing evidence. Spider-Man is bruised from his fight.

A fight to the death…

I can hear the gasps of the big lizard-skin Hulk-guy, my web stretched taut over his mouth and nose, his eyes widening…

Maybe I should tell her… right now… or… maybe not.

I open my mouth, and close it again. "Alien invasion is a weird way to say it," I explain hesitantly. "More like these two weird guys showed up looking for someone, but, Spider-Man appeared and fought them off and set the building on fire. Aunt May and I were out of there way before the fire started."

MJ stares at me like I just insulted her to her face. I feel my heart constrict in my chest. Why does she have to look so _disappointed_ in me?

Ned looks like he's about to pass out. "Spider-Man fought them off?" he repeats.

"Yeah, so I heard," I mumble. "It was a bit of a mob getting away. Got knocked around by the crowd a little bit. That's all."

MJ stares at the bruises on my neck. "So who tried to strangle you?"

"No one! I… I got nailed by some guy's elbow."

Her eyes narrow. "And I don't suppose these _two weird alien guys_ were looking for Ben's stone, were they?"

"They didn't ask for the stone," I say, relieved to not lie about it. "They kept asking for a guy's name. Like a code name or something. They didn't say anything about a stone."

Ned shivers. "Well, I'm glad Spider-Man was there." He gives me a look. "I sure will miss that web-slinger. Since he's in New York. And we'll be on Xandar."

I blink. I didn't think about that. If Spider-Man randomly makes an appearance on Xandar… well, MJ would certainly know. A lot of others might figure it out too. I'll have to figure something else out. Maybe spray-paint the Iron-Spider suit so that it's matte black and neon yellow or something.

"At least you don't have to hide out in a bathroom anymore," I sigh. "Come sit in the box with May and I. Where's your luggage?"

MJ turns abruptly and walks to the third stall, kicking open the door and dragging out a massive black duffel, hanging it over one shoulder, and pulling a smaller backpack off the floor. Ned is wearing his backpack already, but he extracts two smaller rolling suitcases from the same stall, crammed between the walls and the toilet. "We stashed them all in here," Ned snickers. "Right before you knocked in the door."

"You were _so_ loud," MJ sighs. "No wonder he caught us." She gives me a sly smile. "Aunt May will be _thrilled."_

"She might, actually," I reply in the same sarcastic tone. "She - she's having a rough time. She'd love to be distracted with scolding _you_ two instead of me." I hold my hand out expectantly. MJ glares at me at first, and then finally relinquishes and hands me the strap of her duffel.

"Chivalry isn't dead," she mutters with more than her usual sarcasm. If anything, it sounds incredibly bitter. She pushes open the door and holds it open for Ned and I.

"It certainly isn't," Ned replies cheerfully.

"I guess this means you're not picking up my diploma for me," I say with a grin.

"Oh _shit, I forgot you asked me!"_ Ned skids to a halt outside the bathroom door. His face is the picture of martyred horror. "Aunt May is going to _kill_ me!"

"It's just a useless piece of paper," MJ says. "Also, Ned, Peter's just messing with you."

"I am," I say quickly. "I don't care. I can't say the same for May, but, I truly don't care. It's fine."

"I'm dead," Ned groans. "And I thought I was done dealing with angry adults today…"

"Your parents?" I ask.

Ned nods, frowning.

"It got sorta ugly," MJ offers. "His parents got home and we were sitting in the living room with our suitcases, all ready to go. That pissed them off."

"They weren't expecting to say goodbye so soon, is all." Ned says slowly. "My mom gets extra shrieky when she's sad."

"I'm really sorry, Ned," I say. I adjust the weight of MJ's duffel, trying to pretend it takes _some_ effort and that I don't have super-strength. "I feel like it's my fault…"

"Your aunt is giving us tickets to go off planet, when she could have sold them for extra cash," MJ says. "It has _nothing_ to do with you. Don't be self-absorbed."

I give her a curious glance, eyebrows raised. Again, her hostile tone doesn't seem to… belong to the conversation we're currently having.

"Sorry," MJ mutters, looking away. "I'm operating at a low battery. I said goodbye to my parents too."

"And Shawn?" I ask. "It must be really hard. Leaving someone you love."

"I don't love Shawn," MJ says with such vehemence that it shocks me. "I don't love him at all." She stomps ahead of us, passing through the door into the low-ceilinged cafeteria.

Ned and I glance at each other slowly.

"I guess they broke up," Ned huffs. "That's the only explanation. She loved him _yesterday."_

"Ned, can I grab this suitcase for you?" I ask meekly, really not wanting to gossip about MJ behind her back - especially if she's heartbroken. Of course that makes me want to drop everything and throttle Shawn… if he hurt her feelings… well. Maybe MJ has already. She's totally capable of doing her own throttling.

"Oh my god, dude, yes," Ned says, "Please, my back is _killing_ me."

I take one of Ned's rolling suitcases, and we walk through the tables together. MJ waits uncertainly on the other side looking through the other doors, scanning for Aunt May in the boxes and unsure of where to go.

"To the left," I say, "Over by the wall. 2A."

MJ doesn't look at me, she starts off briskly towards Aunt May in our box.

May is awake and looking a bit worried and pale, wringing her hands. She sees MJ first, and her eyes widen with surprise.

"Ugh, here we go, brace yourself," Ned whispers more to himself than me. "She's going to be so mad about your diploma, dude…"

Then May sees Ned and me over MJ's shoulder, and she looks even more confused.

"Um," Aunt May starts to say. "Hello - kids - what are you _doing_ here…" she's thrown off by MJ dropping her backpack on the floor and throwing her thin arms around Aunt May's neck, burying her face in her shoulder.

Wait - is she _crying?_

There's no way MJ is crying right now. She's just… being oddly clingy.

"Oh, sweetie, it's okay," Aunt May immediately flips the switch from slightly confused and possibly pissed to mother-bear-defending-a-cub. She rubs her back comfortingly and glares at us standing awkwardly behind her. "I know, I know," May whispers, even though she probably has no idea. "This is going to be hard," she continues, "You're okay."

MJ's shoulders look small. "I know," she replies, and her voice is muffled.

"Why don't you boys put all the luggage in the storage," Aunt May instructs.

Ned and I scramble to obey her, and Aunt May leads MJ over to the bench and sits her down.

"Sorry," MJ mumbles, grinding the heel of her hand beneath her eyes. "I haven't slept in 24 hours, and I said goodbye to my parents, and then, and then Shawn…"

May rubs her back in a motherly gesture.

"Then _Shawn..._ " MJ pauses. "Well, let's just say we're not going to try and make it long-distance."

Ned and I look at each other again. MJ glances up at us, embarrassed, and back at May. "You were right," she says. "What you said when I was at your apartment that day. About love meaning making the hard choices even if it makes us unhappy."

May nods. "I'm sorry to hear that, sweetheart. I really am."

MJ sighs. "So. Ned and I decided to bail on Earth a little early."

Ned sits across from them. "It didn't seem right, you know. You guys fleeing for your lives while we graduate and stuff."

May nods. "As long as you said goodbye to your families. That's important. This isn't a split-second sort of decision. But I guess it's too late now, anyway. We've left port."

"So you're not mad about the diplomas?" Ned whispers meekly.

Aunt May opens her mouth to protest, slams her mouth shut, and lowers her chin to glare at Ned beneath her brows. "You had one job, Ned Leeds."

MJ snorts with laughter.

Ned pales. "Uh...I'm really sorry..."

"Don't be, I'm messing with you," May sighs, suddenly exhausted. "People are more important than a piece of paper any day. Haven't you both guessed that yet?" She rubs MJ's back again. "You're both being very brave. Jumping into this. Escaping this planet while you have the chance."

"Do you really think our parents will be able to follow someday?" Ned asks.

May answers honestly, looking away. "I don't know, Ned."

Ned sobers and wrings his hands. I sit beside him slowly, and look at MJ. "You going to be okay?" I ask.

MJ sighs. "What? Never see a girl cry before?"

"I didn't know you were crying," I shrug.

MJ lets out a wincing _huff_ of laughter. "Then I wasn't."

"Why don't you kids try to get some sleep?" Aunt May interjects. "Look, you can pull out this piece, like so, and the bench unfolds into sort of a weird futon. No, uh, mattresses, unfortunately. At least these seats are cushioned. They have blankets here on the shelf. You can use those." She winks at me. "Slightly comfier than a rain jacket."

I grin. "Oops."

"Thanks, May," Ned says. "You're the best."

MJ and I pull blankets out of the shelf. Ned settles sideways on the bench and struggles with his blanket. I reach over and tug the end that is tangled until it pulls down over his feet. A Ned-sized lump smiles up at me. "Thanks."

MJ turns her back to us, moving to the furthest corner of the bench and curling up beneath the window I was looking through earlier. She draws a blanket over herself and rests her head on the arm.

I sit down next to Aunt May with a sigh, and she puts one arm around my shoulders. "Are you happy your friends are here?" she whispers.

"I'm grateful," I whisper back. "I just… hope they'll be okay."

"They'll be okay," Aunt May says. "You kids are so _resilient._ You've adapted to every freaky shit-show this universe has thrown at you."

"So have you," I remind her. "We learn that from you, you know."

Aunt May doesn't answer. She nods, bites her lip, and looks at MJ and Ned. Ned's mouth is already hanging open in a whiffling, soundless snore.

MJ isn't asleep, but she looks like she's desperately trying to be. Trying so hard to sleep that she's grimacing, her eyes squinted shut and a firmly placed frown on her face.

…

 _Michelle Jones_

…

 _Last Night_

 _..._

"I don't need to be _saved._ I can take care of myself," I say.

"You always do."

 _You always do._

Shawn says it affectionately, as if this is a trait he admires in me. But there's a hardness in his eyes I can't place. Something resentful.

"What's that supposed to mean?" I ask.

"You know exactly what it _means,"_ Shawn replies cryptically. "It means that you've got to take care of yourself first. That's how it's going to be. You have a chance to go off planet! You've got to take it!"

"I'm not trying to be all noble and shit like my dad when I say I won't leave you…"

"Oh, but you will. That's not an _option."_ His usually pale face is blushing, like he has a fever.

"Tell me what you're thinking," I say firmly. "I can't read your mind."

"Somehow I knew this was how it was going to go down. The door opens and you'd take it. No matter what. Follow Peter Parker to the ends of the earth."

I jolt back as if he electrocuted me. "You think this is about _Peter?"_

"It doesn't matter if I'm here. If he's gone, so are you. I can see that's how it's going to be. I'm just going to have to accept that."

"So that's it, Shawn?" I ask, disbelievingly. "You want to be one of those toxic white _assholes_ that think women base all of their decisions on _men?_ I'm not going because of Peter. I'm going because my parents are telling me to. I'm not choosing this!"

"And _you're_ one of those girls that turns on us the second we have an opinion about a hard truth you have to face. You go where Peter goes, I accept that. But your denial is ridiculous - no, it's insulting. I think you're glad your parents are making you go."

"Back the _fuck_ up," I say. "You're angry with me because one of my best friend's aunt's is trying to save my life? And my parents just happened to agree to her crazy plan? And you think it's because my friend just happens to be _Peter?_ In your small little brain you cannot possibly contemplate that it has anything to do with the air quality, could you? No, it must be that I'm secretly in _love_ with him and you're the sacrificial victim willing to step aside for it? Hell to the _fuck_ no."

Shawn glowers angrily. "This is why I knew it would never work long term with you, Jones. The _second_ we have a difference of opinion, you _target_ me like I'm some internet troll and you're all high and mighty and calling me names. That makes you look crazy, you know that? I'm just trying to have an honest conversation with you. Good boyfriends are the kinds that communicate. This is me, communicating."

"This is you being an asshole," I respond. "You know why?"

"Why?" he says sarcastically.

"Because if you _loved_ me, if you had any self-confidence in our relationship at all, you wouldn't have thought _twice_ about Peter Parker. You would have thought; how nice, May Parker is a saint. That's awesome. I'm so happy my girlfriend isn't going to die choking in her sleep from a leaky apartment. You should be happy for me."

"You don't get to tell me what makes me happy. I'm terrified of losing you. I hate the idea of you not being here!"

"If you loved me," I repeat, " _You'd want to save me too."_

"It's not that simple!"

"It is simple! You'd be happy for me! And then you - you'd be getting off planet too. It'd be temporary."

"Only in this fantasy world you live in, Jones. This is not one of those ridiculous novels you read under your desk in class. I'm not getting off planet. Not any time soon. If I had the money I'd be gone already."

"See? It's not so _hard!_ You admit if you had the money you would have left already! Left _me!_ And I'd be stoked for you. Jealous, but okay with it. Because you'd be okay."

"Who are you fucking kidding? I'm not going anywhere and it's not the same."

"You can't keep comparing hypotheticals."

"It's not hypothetical. You're _leaving_ me and you expect me to be happy about it?"

"Well, I definitely didn't expect you to accuse me of having a thing for Parker. That wasn't part of the plan. Can we go back to the part where you assume I'd only leave for him? That I wouldn't just leave to save my own ass? I'd prefer you think that, because at least it'd be honest and not your own... performance issues!"

"You think you're such a _cool_ cat, Michelle. It works with Parker and Leeds, but it doesn't work for me." He jabs his finger into my collarbone. "That devil-may-care-fuck-you attitude is just covering up that scared little girl inside who is selfish and rude towards anyone who thinks differently than her."

I look up at him. "Don't you touch me ever again."

"MJ…"

"Don't you _fucking_ touch me. It's over. We're done. That's it."

"Fine," Shawn says shortly. "It's not like we were dating exclusively, anyway. Enjoy your _friends._ And your new life."

"We were dating exclusively," I exclaim shortly, unable to keep the hurt from my voice this time. "Weren't we?"

Shawn throws out his arms in a _what are you gonna do about it_ shrug. "I'm a popular guy. Everyone knows that. You knew that."

"Who else were you dating?" I snarl. "Why give me so much shit about leaving if you've got back up plans?"

"Learned this from you, Jones. Keeping my options open. I always knew you'd abandon me from the beginning. That you can't be bothered with collateral damage."

By this time, he's turning to walk down the steps.

"Go fuck yourself, Shawn," I yell out after him. "Better get your practice in now because that's all you have to entertain yourself after _any_ woman gets to know the real you. They won't be able to get off planet FAST ENOUGH!"

He holds up his middle finger over his shoulder without bothering to turn around, and then disappears around the corner of the stairs to the parking lot below.

I fall limply against the balcony wall. I thought he had liked me. _Really_ liked me.

And I had liked him. _A lot._

…

 _Tony Stark_

...

 _Last Night_

"Stark, I grow tired of your inability to focus."

I lift my head blearily. "I'm not losing focus. I'm losing consciousness. There's a big difference."

"You humans are such fragile creatures," Loki's mouth curls up with a sneer. "Sheep amongst giants, you walk only as long as mere few decades will allow. Tell me - who mourns you if you do not wake again?"

"Your brother would," I snap, "He wouldn't forgive you. Do you really wana risk that?"

Loki falters ever so slightly, turning away so I cannot see his expression. "Take care, Stark. You know nothing of my family."

"I know your brother. We're pals. Chums." I affect a British accent. "Closer kin, I think, than an accidental adoption of a frost giant. He'll defend my honor if you kill me and wipe the floors of my lab with your blood." My own blood loss is making me woozy again, and I giggle. "Perhaps he buries me in whatever tomb of honor has been waiting for _you."_

Loki snarls and turns in my direction, eyes glinting. "You get under my skin like a sickness, Stark. Consider how you use your tongue - or lose it." He whirls around and marches for the far side of the room, and I realize this is no random tantrum that he's stomping away from.

Something is coming. There's a strange movement in the air, like a magnetic force is swirling somewhere nearby, and through the partial remains of a door - something steps through what is left of the frame.

It looks like Squidward from Sponge-Bob. _Huh. Didn't see that coming_.

Instead of green skin, it's gray and sort of old and crinkly-looking, wearing black armor and sporting wispy white hair hanging off the back of his wrinkled scalp.

"Who the hell are you?" I ask.

"Report," Loki ignores me, marching towards this weird ass guy. Whom, I realize, is floating a foot off the ground. He's not using his feet for walking.

The alien narrows his gaze at Loki, and I realize that this _thing_ is probably about ten times more dangerous than the god of mischief.

"Say please," the alien replies smoothly, and his voice sounds like it belongs in guided meditation, except maybe for serial killers and dictators. _You're walking on a beach… the bodies of all your victims lay in a row alongside of you..._

"Please," Loki replies through a gritted smile. "You know we're both under the command of one. I've done favors for you, and now, you may give me the information I seek."

"We have found someone who knows Underoos," the alien replies. I feel my heart sink inside my chest. "He will lead us to him, tell us where he is, or he'll die."

I flinch inside the blue suspension energy. Loki glances over at me, and back at his ally. "Then why are you here? Why have you not brought him before me?"

"We were outmatched by the man in an iron suit," answers the alien.

Loki whips his head towards me, and I shrug as best I can. "You know where I've been," I quip. "Must've been a super fan."

"There's your man of iron," Loki points accusingly at me. "This is the one the Midgardians call thus _._ Is this whom you fought?"

"I did not see his face," the alien responds, far too calmly for Loki's liking. I can see the power at play here. Loki is a whining prince compared to this lethal weapon. He glances me over with a neutral expression. "The one I fought was small, and slight. Smaller than your prisoner."

"Smaller?" Loki scoffs. "What could you and your compatriots do so poorly that you could not fair against one small man?"

"Cull Obsidian is dead," the alien replies without stooping to his taunts. "I have been injured, and must return to my ship for repair. Proxima Midnight will finish the task you have requested."

I narrow my eyes at him. He doesn't look particularly injured, but, there does seem to be _some_ scarring damage on his forehead. Perhaps that was the injury and he heals quickly.

"She'd better, if she ever intends to return home to her precious Corvus," Loki snaps. "Or we shall _all_ answer to your master."

The alien smiles evilly. "There is no greater honor, is there not?"

With that, he looks in my direction, his beady eyes flicking from left to right, taking in my appearance with cold indifference. "Maybe one day these men of iron will be as children in our kingdom."

"Or they shall rot," Loki replies. "Anyone can fall out of favor - as easily as a snap of the fingers."

The alien curls his lip with dislike. "Rejoice in what is required of us, and you will be rewarded as much as I. If you fail, your punishment will be like that of the Kree-woman we fought all those years ago."

My chest hurts at the mention of Carol. To hear her sacrifice spoken of so loosely, without the respect she deserves…

And there's no question of it now. Loki and this alien-yahoo are under the impression they are still working for Thanos. Even though Thanos is dead, killed by Captain Marvel _all those years ago_ like the alien said.

They could not be possibly moving under any direction except for their own war-lust, right? Thanos is dead. They have no leader. The children are scattered. Most of his favorites were killed that day - maybe these were hidden in the shadows, waiting to emerge for another time.

Thanos could not _possibly_ be alive. Carol Danver's death was not in vain.

"Till we meet again," the alien says mockingly, turning and floating back through the door. I hear his movements in the hall before they disappear, and I wonder how he got here without being noticed. A ship? Or floating above smog cover?

For now, Peter Parker is alive - he's killed the alien's cohort, but there is one still alive and prepared to hurt him. He better be on the ark when it leaves in the morning…

Jesus, Scott, where are you?

Loki turns toward me, and for the first time, I see the briefest vulnerability in his eyes. He's bitten off more than he can chew. He likes this alien less than I do. Only because I don't know him. Loki's hatred has a history.

"If you could but tell me where to find the man you called," Loki says urgently, "We may spare whoever wears your suit. I _can_ send messages and call Proxima off. If you just tell me where to find him."

"You don't get it, do you?" I whisper, my wound clenching so hard with pain that I suck in a breath and look at the floor. "You just don't get it. I'm not talking. About any of it. You might as well kill me." I look up again, and Loki looks uncertain. "Why are you even working with that loser?" I ask. "He'll clearly stab _you_ in the back the first chance he gets."

"I only ally myself with him because I chose the winning side," Loki snaps. "If you were intelligent, you would do the same."

"You don't believe much in your brother, do you? I assume he's on the _opposite_ side of whatever _that_ thing is."

"It's too late for that. How can anyone put their stock in their own blood when someone else holds the universe in their fingertips?" Loki marches back towards me, standing in front of me with his fists clenched at his sides. "Tell me where to find your companions - this Underoos fellow and the one who wears the iron, if they are not one and the same. I will bring them in for questioning before Proxima reaches them. She has a special… affinity for tracking infinity stones. This is your last chance. I'm offering to help _you,_ Stark. I will not do so again."

For a moment, I falter. I actually consider the risks of Loki knowing where Peter is, verses whatever _thing_ this Proxima is. If she's a friend of the other alien, and she's sent in to clean up when others have died - she must be as threatening as they come. Of course I wonder why these shitheads always seem to save the most lethal for last and conduct their attacks one at a time.

But there's no time to answer Loki and make a decision in any regard. I hear a female's voice from the other end of the room.

"I'd say it's nice to see you again, Loki Laufeyson. But… it's really not."

Loki whirls around. " _Carter."_

My head drops to my chest and the darkness takes me.

…

 _Ned Leeds_

...

My stomach is growling and I can't sit on the bench and pretend I'm sleeping anymore. I shove the blanket aside and pop my knuckles, then my neck, then my back. I guess we're lucky we're in a box - but - man, I miss my bed at home. I love my bed. My worn mattress. The sort of off-smell of my room because my mom sprays febreeze everywhere with passive aggression instead of just yelling at me to do my laundry.

What if saying goodbye last night was the last time I ever see my parents? What if they can't afford tickets? What if the atmosphere explodes and I'm safely on Xandar and we look through super-high-def space-binoculars and can see the mushroom cloud of what's left of Earth far across the galaxy? What if…

I frown and take a deep breath. Not cool, brain. Stay focused. Stay happy. Don't think about all the ways it could go wrong.

I look through the small porthole window over MJ's head. A bit of ocean spray mists up, and I can see the wide, gray-brown expanse of daylight over the Atlantic. It's not as yellow as it is in civilized areas, but the sky still looks sort of poison. More stormy.

There's nothing from here to the horizon, and probably several hours in now towards our destination. It should take a few days to get to Africa.

I hear a lot of chatter and movement in the other areas, so I shuffle in that direction, fighting off a yawn. I wander out of the box and go back to the cafeteria, which is finally open. I eagerly get in line, my stomach letting off another growl. It takes way too long for them to serve each one, and I've been in line for a solid twenty minutes before I throw my hands onto the counter and eye the menu above the cashier's head.

"Uh, four black coffees, please," I say, "Um - so - what's the special?" I'm joking, but, part of me actually wants to know if there is anything available _not_ on the menu,

The woman glares at me. "There's no special. Toasted waffles, hard boiled eggs, or synthetic protein bars. You are aware of the state the world is in, right? Like… there's a food shortage?"

I gulp. "Uh. Yeah. Four toasted waffles and four hard-boiled eggs, please." I hesitantly pull out the wad of cash that my dad had pushed into my hands mere seconds before I went out the door.

"A little spending money," he had said, his eyes weeping. "For snacks. So you're not a burden to May. She's done so much already."

I had taken the cash in my fists, looking at several twenties, a few ones and fives, and there was one crisp one-hundred dollar bill in it, too. "Dad, you'll need this," I had said. "Won't you? Fresh vegetables at the green dome?"

"Don't be silly, Ned," my Dad laughed. "I told you. We're converting your old lizard tank to an indoor garden. We're starting our own green dome. Take it. You'll need it. For your trip." He pushed my hands back. "Don't you think it'll make your mother sleep a little better?"

Of course, I took it.

I wait by the pick-up counter till they push across a small tray with four tiny styrofoam cups, pathetic waffles stacked with burnt edges, and the hard boiled eggs sliding around in a bowl. I pause with the tray at the edge of a table, picking up one egg and sniffing it carefully. Seems okay. Looks a little weird though. Maybe it's not chicken eggs. Maybe it's like… seagull.

Or maybe I'm only thinking that because my tired brain thought it _heard_ a seagull just now. But there wouldn't be a seagull out this far. But it was similar, though. Sort of a screamy-cry. Somewhere maybe above deck.

When I come back with the tray, Michelle is stretching like a cat, May is still asleep, and Peter is yawning with one leg falling off the bench to the floor.

"Wow, you were up early," Michelle says.

"I got breakfast," I announce loudly, trying to smile big and presenting the tray with a little flourish. "They… uh, didn't have much. Like at all. But there's coffee."

Aunt May's eyes pop open like one of those zombie movies. "Do I smell coffee?" she asks, rising out of her blanket.

I sit down across the bench, which creaks loudly. "It's still hot," I say, feeling a little bit better about the whole thing. I am going to have to try to forget about my parents. These are the people I'm going to live with for the foreseeable future. My two best friends and an adoptive aunt… on another _planet._

With clean air that won't kill us in a year.

"Ned," Aunt May says, giving me a look like I'm four and I just presented her with macaroni art. "You're just the sweetest. Peter, wake up. Ned brought us breakfast."

"I'm awake," Peter mumbles, hugging the blanket around himself closer. "I'm just not _awake."_ Suddenly, his eyes pop open.

"Coffee?" I offer.

Peter flies out of the box, faster than I've ever seen him move before.

"Peter!" May calls out.

"What the hell!" Michelle cries.

Peter's standing just inside the entrance of the box, his shoulders tense and heaving with deep breaths. He's looking at the boxes across the width of the arc, matching entrances between the half-walls, several rows of them before the last on the other side, and the portholes above them.

"Stay down," he says over his shoulder.

"Dude, what's wrong?" I ask.

Suddenly, two things happen at once. I see Peter reach out his arm, and he catches a spear in mid-air - a SPEAR. Like a real spear-spear with three tips, a massive _trident_. Like a nearby LARPing event went horribly awry.

Aunt May shoves the back of my head down, making me slip and fall out of the bench. Coffee and waffles go flying across the floor.

"STAY DOWN," Peter repeats over his shoulder. He presses a button on his wrist, and flaps and plates of metal start to unfold like a Transformers cartoon.

Suddenly, he's in a Spider-Man suit. And not just _any_ Spider-Man suit. An upgraded, Iron-made suit.

Michelle gasps. "YOU'VE GOT TO BE SHITTING ME."

"Come on!" Aunt May reaches over and grabs at Michelle's leg. "Get down on the…" her command is broken off by something shaking the entire ship. Like the ol' Titanic just hit the iceberg.

The whole floor shudders beneath us, and Peter - in the Iron-Spider suit - drops the spear down on the floor beside us.

"Use that if you have to," he says, and his voice still sounds like him, but metallic and tinny inside the mask, the white lenses wide and vacant. "Stay in here."

He dashes out of the box.

"Oh my god, Peter!" Michelle cries out hoarsely after him. Her eyes go to the spear. Instantly, she picks it up and crouches on the floor, holding it front of her. Her head swivels towards me. "You knew, didn't you," she says darkly.

Before I can answer, the whole ship shudders again, and both Aunt May and I smack our chins painfully into the floor with the force of it.

I crawl up toward the opening and look out.

There's an alien standing on top of one of the half-walls separating the boxes. There's a huge hole smoking in part of the wall on the left, like she just busted into the room like the Kool-Aid commercial.

Her hands are held out like claws, and horns curl over the back of her long dark hair. She's wearing black and purple-dark armor in complicated twirling pieces on her forearms, chest, and something sort of like a black-lace masquerade mask covering the top half of her pale face. Her evil eyes dart from side to side, looking at Peter, who is facing her, fists clenched at his sides.

"What are you doing here?" he demands. "It's Proxima, right?"

"One and the same," she answers, her voice the very definition of slimy.

"These people are under my protection. You couldn't find your target and your friends are dead. What more could you possibly want?"

"Targets change," the alien - Proxima - snarls, her teeth elongated and her tongue dark like she's been drinking ink. "You carry something I want."

"Oh shit," I whisper. I turn and look at Michelle. "She's totally here for the Asgardian topaz!"

"Infinity stone," May corrects in a strained whisper. "It's an infinity stone."

" _What?"_ repeats Michelle.

"I threw it into the ocean!" Peter shouts. People on the ark are waking up, screaming, dropping their breakfast trays, storming for the entrances. It's like a stampede. Someone gets completely trampled. It turns into a total pandemonium.

Proxima smiles sickeningly. "I can feel it in this room, fool."

"Okay, well, then, good luck finding it," Peter says.

"I'll take it from your corpse!" Proxima suddenly flies at him like a face-hugger, claws extended from her left hand, her right drawing a wickedly-shaped sword from her belt - the blade shaped more like a can opener than knife. The top of the blade is hooked, the other end sharpened to a point that curves inward.

She swipes it magnificently through the air, cutting dangerously close to Peter as he twists his body out of her way. He sends webs blasting at her, each tiny wet sphere knocking her back like the bean-bag pellets the NYPD would use for training.

She leaps aside with comic-book speed and dancer gracefulness, dodging each one. A stream of web shoots out on either side of Peter, turning into a sort of bungee line, and he uses it to bounce back, gain leverage, and drive forward - feet first - into her chest, knocking her backwards.

She crashes through several rows of boxes, disturbing someone people that were still hiding, chunks of wood and plaster flying in every direction.

"We've got to get out here!" Michelle cries. "We should get above deck!"

"I'm not leaving Peter!" May screams.

"He might not fight as much as he can if he's worried we'll be collateral damage," I shout over another huge _bang_ of wood collapsing beneath Proxima's landing body. The _shnk_ of her sword flies, cutting web strands, Peter dodging the blade again and throwing a fist right into her face. "If we get out of the way, he can totally beat her. He can. He's beat worse. Come on!"

"Worse than THAT?" Michelle groans.

May clutches at Michelle, pulling her to her feet and pushing us both out of the box. We turn and duck along the side of the room, trying to stay out of sight, Michelle still clutching the spear.

But I can't help it, I turn to watch over my shoulder, May and Michelle turning left at the corner of the room to try and get to the door.

Proxima is looking _right_ at me.

"Oh, shit," I hiccup.

Before I can even blink, she's pulling a secondary spear off her back, and chucking it in my direction. A slap of web hits me in the chest, tightens, and yanks me off to the side. I let out a very high-pitched screech, and the spear plunges through the wall behind me, the length wobbling with a metallic groan.

I fall face-first onto the floor.

"GET OUT, NED!" Peter screams out, and he twists his body mid air, firing off more web, trying to pin Proxima in place with huge strands. She slices through the strands with her sword, but it does slow her down.

"COME ON," Michelle is pulling me to my feet. "COME ON, LET'S GO!"

May pulls on my other arm, and the three of us practically fall through the door into the now-empty cafeteria like we're the Scooby Gang in a cartoon.

We start to run - dodging tables, aiming for the door at the other end. Why do the emergency exits have to be placed at far ends?! Why can't they have them in every section? Hasn't anyone seen a disaster movie?

Half the wall blows out behind us, and Proxima flies through, mouth hissing with that inky tongue, eyes blazing and blade twirling in one hand. "Let's dance," she taunts loudly, and Peter is throwing his full body against hers, pinning her for a moment against the floor and punching wildly in her face. The grappling turns into a mess of limbs and screams, her sword is knocked from her hand and skids along the floor.

A snap of web picks it up and throws it across the room, and she's diving after it… kicking her leg out behind her in a freaky-ass karate type of move, where it catches Peter right under the chin and he falls backwards. Proxima suddenly leaps straight into the air, disappearing into an air duct.

"NED!"

I whirl and look at Michelle and May in horror. "We've got to…"

The ship shudders again, violently. Suddenly the plaster of the ceiling falls open on top of us, huge white pieces cracking open on our heads, knocking us down. Proxima falls right in the midst of us, plunging through the hole in the ceiling.

I can see exposed pipes and wires above us, the inner workings of the ark between decks - Proxima's blade flashes in an arc in the air - and her arm catches right in the three-prongs of her own spear.

She shrieks inhumanly in pain and surprise, wrenching her arm away. Michelle stands in fierce terror, holding the spear in her hands, a sickly alien-blood stain now on the tips of the spear. Without pausing, she shoves the spear forward again, trying to catch Proxima unexpectedly. The alien easily knocks the spear aside this time, plunging her sword right for Michelle's unprotected abdomen -

Peter swings in like Tarzan, colliding with her in a mess of sounds and bodies, Michelle is knocked to the ground, Peter's arm is hooked around Proxima's neck, and they fall to the ground together. Somewhere in the white dust of the fallen sheets of plaster, Aunt May is struggling out from beneath one of them, and she's helping me up, and I can't see MJ anymore - or Peter - he's beneath Proxima -

She throws him straight up into the air, he crashes into the ceiling above her, and she whips out her sword and holds it in front of her - so when he falls, he'll land right on the blade.

She hisses angrily when he sticks to the ceiling, plaster crumbling, and begins to speed-crawl along the ceiling, hand over hand like a literal spider escaping across an apartment ceiling.

"COME BACK, YOU COWARD," she roars in a demonic shriek. She rushes after him, leaping and curving through the air like a gymnast on crack.

"Green light," Peter cackles with fear and badly-timed humor, pressing his fingers to his palm and sending another sticky-ball grenade against one of the portholes.

There's a blast of hot air, a snap of web, and the side of the ark completely - blows - open, exposed to the morning gray air, the plunging roaring mess of ocean, and screams from above deck.

I hardly remember running up the stairs into the emergency exit stairwell, my lungs feel like they might explode. Sweat cascades down my face, back, arms. Michelle brings up the rear, running half-backwards, pointing the spear behind us, afraid Proxima won't follow Peter through the hole in the wall.

"You've taken this really well," I somehow crack a joke, panting through the feeling of absolutely dying from exertion.

"SHUT UP, NED!" Michelle screams, pushing me the last few steps till we're out the door, and falling into a crowd of people clustered together on the deck.

A security guard with an automatic weapon is suddenly in front of us, wrenching the spear out of Michelle's hands.

"Hey! I want that! For protection!" Michelle snarls in his face, reaching for it again. The guard points his gun right at her chest.

Aunt May leaps in front of her, holding her hands out to the man with the gun. "We're just passengers! We grabbed the spear off the floor! Don't listen to her!" she whirls around and grabs Michelle by the shoulders and gives her a hard shake. "I AM NOT LOSING YOU ON OUR FIRST DAY," she screams, pushing at us both towards the crowd. "Come on! Come on!"

The wind tugs angrily at our clothes, like a really windy day at the beach, only there's no motel to escape to and we're under attack by aliens. So considerably less fun than a beach trip.

The cloud cover is low, and brown-gray, like a dirty ceiling trying to lean in. There's other guards standing protectively around some of the passengers.

I spy several running like crazy across the wide, empty carrier-length. Without any quinjets on it, it looks sort of eerie and empty. I spy someone that _has_ to be the captain with his white hat and a hand-held radio in his hand, screaming " _Mayday, Mayday! Come in!"_

"Where's Peter?" I whisper hoarsely, trying to take deep breaths, but it's hard.

"Up there!" Michelle points, and everyone's gazes snap up.

Proxima had crawled onto the deck from the hole in the side of the ark, flipping up on top of the part of the helicarrier where they would command operations, like those aircraft carriers that have flag bridge where they can guide the planes and radio in and out. She has broken one of the windows in doing so, standing on top of it by the antennae, coaxing Peter forward mockingly.

He's flipped up over the small rail blocking the edge of tower-top, firing off webs in her direction, but they either sail past her when she dodges or she cuts through them with that evil-looking blade. I spot something out of the corner of my eye.

There's another ship on the horizon. The flying kind.

"Hey, hey! Look at that!" I point. "Look! Someone's coming to help!"

The crowd looks in that direction, some of them beginning to scream and wave their arms in the air.

"Calm down! Calm down!" one of the guards is yelling. "You'll cause a panic! They've already radioed! They're on their way!" No one listens to him.

A surge of random passengers begin to rush the Captain, screaming incoherently. Some of the arm men try to shoot their guns in the direction of where Proxima and Peter were fighting - but it looks like they went on the other side of the bridge. We can't see them.

"STOP!" I hear the Captain scream. "HOLD YOUR FIRE! THE CIVILIANS ARE TOO CLOSE!"

"Don't fucking shoot _spider-man!"_ someone from the crowd screams. "You idjits! He's going to save us from the aliens just like he did in New York!"

The ship in the distance looks sort of like a giant quinjet, but more streamlined, solid matte black with weird writing on the wing that I can't read. It's racing for us at breakneck speed.

"That's Wakandan," Michelle shouts over the panicking crowds. There's even more now, people coming from below decks from the other side, gathering in small groups. Some of these jerks are trying to film the fight on their phones, which is still on other side of the radio tower -

And now it comes around again, the Spider-suit glinting slightly in the morning light, a cry of exertion from Peter as he flips backwards.

"There he is!" I point him out to May.

One of the guards points his gun in their direction, ignoring the Captain's command. Michelle races for him and completely body-slams him to the ground. "Sorry, I tripped," she screams loudly in his ear, managing to roll over onto his wrists, pinning his gun to the ground. "I'm SO CLUMSY," she bawls in his face, and his eyes are wide at the sight of this teenage girl pinning his weapon - _accidentally_ \- to the ground.

Peter's body flails up over the edge of the rail, grabbing it and hoisting himself up, and diving out of the way just as Proxima's sword juts down into the metal. Sparks fly off the blade from the force of it, and Peter is dodging, weaving, and bobbing out of her way. I can't tell if he's being smart to try and conserve his strength or if it's all purely defense because he's totally outmatched and she is tiring him out.

"Face me, worm," Proxima calls out. "Or others will suffer!"

The another group of passengers - the ones closest to the bridge - try to press back, but there's nowhere to go except run across the open deck and be totally exposed, or go backwards off the side to the ocean below.

Peter and Proxima each have a deadly grip on each other's wrists, their weight shifting from side to side, trying to out-push the other. Proxima bears down on him, gaining the upper hand, and shoves him away from her.

She careens off the side of the bridge and jumps right into the crowd of passengers, knocking several down, and her blade swings wide - she seems to be taking too long to choose her innocent, bystanding victim, a huge, wicked smile on her face.

The crowd shrinks back, nowhere to run, but she doesn't strike yet, her eye flicks to the left, noticing the approaching quinjet.

Peter leaps down, grabbing at her wrist again. The crowd scatters to every corner of the deck, several running in our direction. Proxima acts way too worried and perplexed by the grip he has on her wrist - lets go of the blade - catches it in her other hand, turns to face him. She shoves the curved blade right into the Spider-suit, through the thin seam between the cover-pieces of the dark blue-spider emblem on the chest and the gold lining of the ribs and waist.

A horrible, _horrible,_ groaning scream wrenches out of Aunt May beside me. Michelle scrambles to her feet. Proxima smiles into Peter's mask, almost nose to nose, wriggles the pommel of the blade around. A tinny choking-sound emits from inside the suit - no funny comments, no _it's just a scratch,_ just a coughing, ragged sound, and then he's wrestling with her hands, trying to push her - and her blade - away. And he falls to one knee, and she lets him, hands free of the blade sticking out of him.

"NO!" I shout hoarsely. _This isn't happening. This isn't happening._

The Wakandan quinjet jolts to a weird hover-mode beside the ship, and a figure falls from a ramp sliding open in the back - a small circle flies through the air like a frisbee, slices right through Proxima's head and shoulders, and whistles back through the air.

Her body falls to the deck, and her head rolls away like a soccer ball kicked in the wrong direction.

The figure catches the flying disc, tucks, rolls, and lands in a perfect crouch before standing on the deck efficiently, with a grim look of steely resolve. _Holy shit this guy just jumped out of a jet onto a ship and still managed to kill an alien Peter's been fighting for like - five minutes? Ten? Twenty?_

I catch a glimpse of dark blue uniform, and a white star on his chest. When he turns, I see the disc - it's a shield. _The_ shield.

 _Holy shit, that's Captain America._

...

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...

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 **Dearest readers,**

 **Thank you so much for all the love you've sent by your reviews, and adding me to favorites/follows! It means the world to me! I am sorry it took so long to get this chapter done, I am up to my EYEBALLS in Bridal Shower planning (not my own, ha) and I had the flu week before last and I was down for the count! I've been SO tired the last few days, haven't quite fully recovered my energy after being so crazy sick. But every chance I had I was plugging away at my fiction (both fan fiction and original!) Thank you dearly for your support from afar! Hope you enjoy this chapter! I am sure you recognized a slightly iconic "shortcut to mushrooms" scene, for those of you playing along at home to find the parallels of Lord of the Rings within this story. I also have to send a big thank you to my beta Crystal! You know her as QueenofCrystallopia on this site, fellow friend and fan fiction author of the totally amazing CMFU, Crystal's Marvel Fanfiction Universe, home of the Paint it Black series. Even though she's hella busy this week she took a look at this chapter for me. We didn't get a chance to talk about it yet but I begged and my google docs told me she read it. (that seems sort of creepy, right? Like I swear it's just there. Google decides to say "Edits made by Crystal" when I log on, haha). Anywho, she is amazing, I love her, and I'm super blessed with her help, because she's just that good. I hope you all have an amazing Monday. I am back to the grindstone (aka desk) and I wish you all an amazing week. Personal replies below.**

 **Love, Pip**

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 **Personal Review Replies**

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Black' Victor Cachat - Haha, your wish is my command! Corvus is hiding and we've got some dead Thanos zealots! Yeah Peter's going to feel the effects of killing a little less because he's a little older, and in this version, the world's a little darker. I am so glad you're enjoying my story, thank you so much for reading! (I love Brutasha too! If you haven't read my other fic Avenge The Departed, that one has some great Brutasha moments in it... amongst other things lol)

LoonyLovegood1981 - I am so glad you are enjoying my story! Thank you for being such a loyal reader! Hugs!

Tightpants182 - AHHH I'm so sorry it stressed you out but at the same time that's so gratifying for me to hear because I was stressed while I was writing it, haha. Thank you so so much for your amazing compliments, I am feeling so blessed. Thank you for your loyal reading, I am so pleased you're enjoying my story! Thank you!

curry-llama - Thank you SO much, as usual, you always write such great reviews and it makes me feel so humbled. Thank you for your kind words about the fight scene, fight scenes are SO hard for me to write.

EleanorGardner - LOL yeah I've seen so many theories that range from hilarious to obscene. The ware house scene was loosely based on a missing scene from the books that didn't make it into the movies, when the hobbits go to Frodo's cousin Freddy's house and stay, but have to escape out the back door from the Black Riders, and Freddy runs for the village to raise the alarm. From their the hobbits go to Buckleberry Ferry/Bree, like they do in the movies. It's one of my favorite scenes, and it's so sad to not see it in the film! And this last one was based on their little trip to Farmer Maggot's "Shortcut to Mushrooms" and from there, Bree, and now Weathertop :) Thanks so much for your review!

cargumentluv - Thank you SO much I am so happy you are enjoying my story

lone ranger22 - lol YUP, she shot him!

GalaxyNifflers - Oh, my, god, thank you so much for your compliment. I'm aghast. I'm blushing. I can only say thank you a gazillion times and send internet hugs! wow!


	6. Flight to the Ukuwela

warning: whump/angst/injury sort of stuff

...

* * *

 **...**

 **Six - Flight to the _Ukuwela_**

 **…**

* * *

 _Peter Parker_

…

 _2017_

"Hey, Uncle Ben," I said into the cellphone, wincing and looking at the view. The jaundiced New York skyline was dim. Disgusting.

"I just, wanted, to… uh… leave you a quick message. I just wanted to say I'm really sorry about what I said this morning. It wasn't fair to you. And you haven't answered any of my texts. Or calls. I mean, I know you're working… but… I just wanted to make sure you heard it. Right away. I'm really sorry. Will you… will you call me when you get this? Okay. Um. Thanks…"

I hung up the phone, and I felt my spider-sense go crazy. Those sirens I had ignored from earlier, frustrated at the fight that Uncle Ben and I had that morning before school, was _still_ wailing away. Whatever it was, it must've been _bad._

I felt gloomy about checking out the sirens. Not heroic.

I sighed petulantly and leapt off the building, enjoying the freedom of free-fall for a moment before sending out a stream up web, swooping through the air like a yo-yo, hitting the end of the tether, swinging up into the glorious heights again, back down, and up again, clinging to the side of the building, leaping, and catching myself again.

The sirens sounded _awfully_ close to where Uncle Ben works. The spinning red lights were close to the same skyscraper, anyway - no, not close. There. Parked around the base, in the streets, police tape blocked it off - I heard the words rise up, overwhelming me at once from the super-hearing.

The crowd murmured behind the police barriers.

 _There's an active shooter inside…_

I had felt my heart drop thoroughly into my chest, somewhere in my stomach, perhaps. That's where Uncle Ben worked. The building where the shooter was.

I think I knew - then. Even with my persistent hope. Even without confirmation. Uncle Ben would have called me back, if he could. He would have been watching his phone like a hawk. Waiting for me to call when I was ready.

...

 _Present_

…

"Peter."

"Yeah," I choke out. It hurts to speak. I'm looking at the deck of the ship, and I'm on my knees. Both hands are curled around the pommel of the blade plunged through my abdomen.

That sickly moment replays again - the resistance of the suit - not enough for alien material - then the resistance of my flesh, giving way - the cutting through, the blade biting into me, the skin, muscle - organs? - sharp, sharp, sharp, _sharp metal_ punching through. How weakly and softly my body just seemed to accept the presence of the blade like it was supposed to be there, that horrible sting of a paper-cut magnified by the smell of blood and slamming, pounding pain lacing through my whole abdomen.

There's a copper taste in the back of my mouth, acidic against my teeth. My hands immediately going to the handle of the blade, wanting to pull it out, knowing if I do, I'll probably bleed out in minutes.

I've heard the cautionary stories. _If you're impaled, don't pull the thingy out…_

"Peter, stay with me," a male's voice. _Uncle Ben?_ "Don't - don't mess with that. Leave it in. Sorry, kid. Not till a professional can do it safely."

"Uh huh," I whisper hoarsely. I blink and twitch my head a little from side to side trying to shake away the cobwebs. It's gray and matted inside my skull, keeping me from thinking straight.

"STAND BACK!" shouts a voice. "GIVE US SOME SPACE! BACK OFF!"

 _MJ._ She's yelling at someone. Or several someones.

"BACK THE FUCK UP!"

"Do you have any emergency medical equipment?" the man asks.

Another man answers. "Just those little boxes with band aids and alcohol swabs and shit. Nothing that would help you right now."

"How close are we to port? When did you leave New York?"

"Several hours ago! We left at - four a.m. We're no where close to a hospital… I'm so sorry…"

"It's not your fault," says the first. "Thank you for getting the others below deck… the less see him like this, the better."

"Peter, honey," whispers Aunt May, right next to me. I blink vapidly, the lenses on my mask constricting, widening, and constricting again. "Can you hear me?"

With nothing but a thought, I make the mask roll back from my face, the metal whispering as it constricts and folds away. The arm flaps condensing, the chest and ab pieces clinking in the wrong place when it hits resistance where the blade is.

I let out a heaving sound when the suit corrects itself and folds the other way, going around the blade until it is all wound up and disappearing into the brace on my wrist.

Now I'm just sitting here in my jeans and T-shirt again, holding crescent container for the infinity stone in one hand. I was keeping it in the suit. It doesn't fit in the brace on my wrist. When the suit folds away, the stone stays.

"Got th' stone," I say quietly.

I feel MJ kneeling beside me. "Let me hold on to that for you."

"No," I say. "It's - you'd be a target…"

I have very little grip on the container, and it takes a few tugs, but MJ pulls it out of my hand regardless of my protest. "I'm going to hold this for you," she says firmly. "Temporarily. I promise."

I feel myself sinking, sitting back on my ankles in a woozy slump.

I still feel like I can't see very well, even without the mask. Aunt May is sort of kneeling in front of me, but I don't know if I can see her face, or if I'm imagining it. She's bracing me to keep me from falling backwards, letting me sit back.

"I'd like to lay down, please," I say, trying to sound chipper. It doesn't. It just sounds pathetic. "I'm tired. B-b-big fight. So many aliens."

"We shouldn't move you," Aunt May barely manages an answer. "We will in a moment. We'll get you on the jet. Then you can lay down. Hang tight with me for a moment."

"Please don't die, Peter," Ned's voice suddenly croaks out.

"Ned," MJ says quickly. "Don't." She reaches over and grips the edge of his jacket, like he's drowning and she's dragging him to shore.

"Mm'not gonna die," I reply, meeting Ned's gaze. He looks like _he's_ going to pass out sooner than me. "You don't look so good."

"I'm not so worried about me," Ned's voice wobbles.

"Michelle, Ned," Aunt May says calmly, "Go below deck and see if you can get the luggage. Mine and Peter's too. Please."

"Of course, yeah, right away," Ned lumbers away quickly, heading for the closest door to below decks.

"Wait, Michelle," Aunt May stops her for a moment, and I hear her whisper. "There's a firearm and birth certificates in the satchel. Be extra careful."

MJ gives her a grim nod, her eyes flicking towards me briefly before she turns and follows Ned.

I can feel sweat, dry plaster dust, blood leaking around the blade through my middle. I blink again, the people's faces in front of me become oddly clear cut, like a movie filmed in 4K at a higher frame rate than the human eye can follow.

Everything moves just a little too sharply. Too fast. Seconds last a few seconds too long.

The crowds were taken below deck, so I'm no longer a spectacle to be filmed and shouted at. Only the crew is on standby, the ark's captain standing close, respectfully waiting for Captain America's call, directing his crew to help wave down the jet.

Aunt May's hands are on either side of my face, palms white-hot against my cheeks. "He's freezing," she announces calmly.

"We'll take you directly to Wakanda, then, it's a long trip either way," says Steve Rogers, who is the man standing just out of my peripheral vision. "The point being; the medical assistance in Wakanda is far more advanced. Especially in regards to reconstruction and alien technology." He pins a finger to his ear, on the comms. "I don't care if his royal highness asked us not to land on foreign vessels. Land, now, please. I take full responsibility. We have a hurt young person on board. He's a friend."

And then, more to himself; "Should have come and gotten him as _soon_ as there was a - disturbance. I don't know what Stark was thinking. Putting you on a boat like this. Completely exposed."

"Not his fault," I whisper. "He's comprom… Loki. He tried… I had to run..."

"Don't try to talk, baby," Aunt May says. "It's okay." Her head whips around, her voice deadly. "Get him help. _Now."_

Steve leans down into my view. "Hang on, kid. They're landing the jet. We're going to get you on board."

My whole body is shaking like I jumped into an icy lake. I clench my teeth together and try to breathe, but it hurts, and I want to give it up. Maybe put it on pause for a moment.

Steve stands, shields his eyes against the sunless daylight. "He's conscious, that's a good thing."

"He's in _shock,"_ Aunt May corrects. She keeps her hands tight around my shoulders, keeping me upright. Keeping me from falling and hitting my head on the deck. Definitely don't want to add a concussion on top of this. Like it matters anyway. Concussion or no. My chances are slim to none.

I'm a nerd. I understand probabilities. My odds aren't great.

The Wakandan jet pulses through the sky with a _woosh_ sound, the weird triangular wings pulling in and folding against the cabin, steam-sounds coming from the rotors while it lands on the ark deck.

 _You're dying,_ my brain says. _Going out like your Uncle Ben… too soon. Never getting to go to Xandar. Alone and out of your mind. Like him, bleeding out. You couldn't stop it in time._

"Stop it," I whisper to the voice in my head. "Stop. Please stop."

"Peter?" Aunt May asks worriedly.

 _Make it stop,_ my brain pleads. It hurts too bad. But Spider-Man doesn't beg. I don't know, maybe Peter Parker does. I'm not coherent enough to find out.

" _Stop, stop…"_ I repeat blearily. I lose my train of thought, and look down at my hands, still holding the handle of the sword. " _I just wanted it to stop,"_ I whisper. "He wouldn't stop bleeding. I couldn't save him."

It takes her a beat to think of Ben, and realize I'm confused. "It will stop soon," Aunt May says tearfully. "That was a long time ago, Peter. You're going to be okay. Just stay awake for as long as you can. You did _so_ good, Peter. You did so good. I am so proud of you."

The ramp jet yawns open.

Steve suddenly stoops down, thrusting one arm behind my knees, the other around my back, picking me up. While he's careful, the movement still shifts my stomach muscles around the sharpened blade.

Pulsing, red, throbbing. Serrated jolts twist through my whole body. I can feel it in my nervous system, my brain backfiring to the sound of the ark's engines - except every pulse of the engine is the shockwave of pain radiating from the blade.

I groan involuntarily, and my head falls back. If I squint my eyes hard enough, the sky looks less brown. I can almost imagine it blue again. With white clouds and seagulls.

Captain America's profile is furrowed and focused from this angle.

"Sorry, kid," he says quietly. The world around us grows dark as we duck into the jet. It's small, and a little cramped. It's definitely not the renowned _Royal Talon,_ King T'Challa's aircraft. If anything, this shows signs of being a hand-me-down. Something lived out of half the time. Maybe it's Steve's own personal ship.

There's a weird sort of short table in the middle of the cabin, like a console but instead of a screen, there's black, pearly sand, which rolls away like an ocean tide to the edge of the table, getting out of the way, and disappearing into a seam rimming the edge.

Steve sets me down on top of the table, clasping a hand to my shoulder briefly. "Hang tight," he says. He disappears from my view momentarily, returns with a blanket to throw over my legs, and a small pillow. He lifts my head, which feels heavier than a million bowling balls, and tucks the pillow underneath it, and then dashes back to the two Wakandan pilots. He speaks with them in a low voice. One of them shakes his head, and Steve clenches a fist and nods, not liking the answer he's hearing. I wonder what the question was in the first place.

The problem is, I _should_ be hearing it. I have super, spider-sense hearing. Or did, five minutes ago. All I can hear now is a high pitched ringing, fading in and out like a radio signal getting adjusted.

It feels like the jet is rocking from side to side, even though the ark is really big enough not to feel the motion of seawaters. My brain mush sliding from one end of my skull to another. _Dizzy._

"In the hatch," I hear the pilot this time.

"Thank you," Steve replies. He kneels down, opens a hatch behind the pilot's chair, and pulls out a sleek black tub. When he lifts the lid, there's various medical equipment pieces inside. Even Wakandan first aid kits look cooler and fanicer.

I stare at the low ceiling of the cabin. Pipes and wires run from the pilot's console's to the back, all the way to the open ramp, where May, Ned, and MJ all run up, towing luggage and stashing them to the sides. The ramp begins to hiss and close shut behind them, sealing off the smell of the ocean.

Maybe the last time I'll ever see the Atlantic.

I realize I never really said _goodbye_ to New York. We fled. In the dead of night. The ark took off when it was still dark, and I didn't watch the glittering lights from the porthole. A missed opportunity, never to be had ever again. I couldn't even give my neighborhood the courtesy of a friendly Spider-Man note. I could have thrown a paper airplane through the top window office of the Daily Bugle, announcing my retirement.

I could have taken one last look at Ellis Island.

 _Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses…_

May drops everything and comes to my side again, taking my hand and curling her fist tightly around it. "What am I going to do with you, hm?" Aunt May whispers, a fake smile in her voice. "Always getting into trouble."

When I blink, I feel the miniscule itch of salt water in a tiny stream down my face. I'm not crying, my eyes are just watering. A lot.

"We're leaving," Captain America calls back. "Buckle up, and strap him down. We're going to go fast."

MJ and Ned rush into the seats along the bowed wall, tugging the shoulder straps around and buckling in. Aunt May finds the belts along the side of the table, throws one over my waist, and cinches it tight on the other side.

"There," she says with false cheerfulness, "Now we won't be playing yahtzee."

My laugh turns into a thick, phlegmy cough. Blood oozes out of the side of my mouth, which I try not to choke on. I cough it up to keep myself from throwing it up. Blood pools down my neck and onto my shirt and the table beneath me. Making a mess. I'm coughing and spitting blood and drooling on myself and I couldn't care less.

I probably look like patient zero in a zombie movie. I don't think I'm coughing up from what I'm bleeding internally, but whatever was hurt initially in the fight - a punch to the throat or nose, maybe, that I hadn't noticed. But that doesn't keep it from looking bad.

"Sorry," I gurgle. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

Aunt May's eyes widen with fear, but she doesn't curse or panic out loud. "It's okay," she whispers. "You have nothing to be sorry for. You hear me? _Nothing._ You saved every life on that ark, I'm sure of it. That thing would have cut down anyone. You stopped it."

 _I just need to stop…_

"Mrs. Parker," Steve says, "I need you to strap in. Just for take off."

My hand is ice-cold when her hand leaves it. I keep staring at the ceiling. Is this how I go out? Freezing cold and pinned to… to… a Wakandan countertop?!

I shut my eyes and brace myself. "S'okay, Aunt May," I whisper. "I'm just gonna sit right here."

Her warmth leaves my side. "I'll be right back."

The engines aren't very loud. Wakandan technology is not comparable to Shield. Purring and vibrating, the pitch increasing when we take off - not the volume. It's like the Audi that Mr. Stark drove to my graduation pizza party.

 _Was that only last week? Feels like a million years ago._

When the jet lifts off the ark's deck, it feels like the pressure inside the cabin grows dense and heavy, a huge hand pressing down on top of me and filling my ears with cotton. I feel my body lift momentarily against the seatbelt, and then slam back down again.

The gasp I make doesn't really sound human. Sort of a croak and a scream, inward, and then out again. My vision sweeps away in a black flag. My eyelids are burning hot and orange, like I'm trying to shut out sunlight.

When I open my eyes again, I feel like a century has passed. My ears are ringing and the world looks soft and blurry. My shirt's been cut open, and there's bandages holding the blade and wound shut, taped down and keeping it steady.

The jet is flying smoothly now - cruising altitude. Aunt May is kneeling by me again, holding my hand.

"How - long was I out?" I ask wearily.

"About ten minutes," she responds carefully. "You're okay. You're going to be okay. I'm right here. You're going to be _just_ fine."

I try to think of a joke to make, but nothing comes to mind. "No lying," I whisper. "Not allowed, remember?"

Aunt May shakes her head. "You _are_ going to be fine."

…

 _Michelle_

...

The stone feels like a sunburn against my chest, where I crammed the crescent container into my sports bra. It's probably the safest place at this point.

Ned turns towards me, and his face his drawn, his eyes full of tears. "What do we do?" he asks. "What do we do if he dies?"

"Hush," I snap at him. I don't _want_ to be cruel to Ned, but I can't think about that. I can't think about the fact that I'd rather die on Earth with my parents in the bad weather than go to Xandar without Peter Parker. Because then Shawn would've been right after all. And that can't be possible.

I grip the shoulder straps of my seatbelt with my fists. "I'm sorry, Ned," I whisper.

Ned nods tearfully, looking away from me.

I keep my eyes focused on Peter. I don't know how he's still conscious.

And now he's coughing up blood, his breath coming in and out in ragged, gurgling sounds. _Please don't be a death rattle,_ I think morbidly. _Please don't die. Please don't die._

May keeps talking quietly to him. That awful sword sticking up out of his stomach just beneath the ribs, not entirely center but closer to his left side. I know enough from getting an A in health class that his chances of _not_ dying from this are slim. If for some weird reason the blade missed his intestines, kidneys, maybe the bottom part of his lung… it's still bad. Really bad.

"He's going to be fine," I say to Ned in a monotone, keeping my eyes dead ahead. "He's going to be just fine."

Captain America - I'm not one for freaking out about anyone, but _holy fuck it's Captain America -_ tells May to strap in. The jet begins to tilt at a slight angle, and she sits beside me, clicking the seatbelt shut. Captain America straps in behind the pilot and co-pilot, where there are two empty seats.

The pressure in the cabin grows to uncomfortable levels, and it feels like we're trying to get vacuumed out of our seats. Ned shuts his eyes and begins to sweat profusely.

" _We're not going to crash,"_ he whispers to himself. " _We're not gonna crash."_

The sound of the engines are loud, high pitched and whirling, pressing louder and louder against my ear drums till I'm afraid they might burst.

Peter makes a horrible, gaspy-scream, and then his head lolls to the side, his eyes shut and his mouth open.

"He just fainted," I find myself saying out loud. Not sure if repeating it for myself or May. "He's fine. He just needed to pass out for a second. He's fine."

She doesn't wait for the pressure to calm or for the jet to level out. May launches out of her seat. She lifts Peter's face upward, checking his pulse and breathing a sigh of relief. Captain America joins her, pulling things out of the first aid kit. First, something sort of like an IV bag. Keeping him hydrated from blood loss. And then bandages. Not ace bandages, of course. Silky looking shit that he wraps around the blade after cutting Peter's T-shirt open and lining the entry wound with it. It looks like it seals itself around the opening.

Their material is so much more advanced than ours. So not fair.

I wonder about all the people with broken gas masks in New York that could have used a simple _square_ of this silk to seal any breakages and prolong the use of the masks for a lot longer. Maybe less people die in their sleep with pressing this stuff along their window frames.

If I ever get a chance to talk to the King, I am going to have some _major_ words to say to him.

"We should be there in about six hours or so," says the pilot in his thick accent.

Captain America nods. "Thank you."

"Six HOURS?" I repeat. "Peter doesn't have that kind of time."

"An ordinary flight from New York harbors to Wakanda takes fifteen hours," says the pilot. "I kin get you there in less than half the time." He looks over his shoulder at Peter, saddened, and returns to the control wheel. "But no less."

I've been clearly given the hint. _Don't try to tell me to do something I can't do._

I unbuckle my seatbelt, and look at Ned. "You can take those off," I remind him.

Ned shakes his head back and forth. "Seatbelts are always a good idea."

Peter's eyes flutter open. "How long was I out?" he whispers, his voice horrid.

"About ten minutes," May replies. I give them a moment, Peter's voice in a harsh, guttural whisper, and May's responses full of false promises.

I steel my resolve and walk to the side of the table, settling on my knees on the other side. "Hey," I say.

Peter blinks confusedly, and furrows his gaze. Then his expression alights. "MJ," he whispers. "You're here too."

"Of course I am, dummy," I swallow a lump in my throat. My gaze avoids the blade, looking at his pale hand lifting into the air, like he's reaching for something.

Me.

His fingers trail down the side of my face, soft as butterfly wings. I don't even think he knows he's doing it. His skin is gray, and his eyes are incredibly dilated. He looks like he's wearing stage makeup for a corpse.

I reach up and take his hand away from my face and hold it, rubbing it between my palms to try and bring some warmth back into them. They're icy. His breath slides in and out of his mouth like he's blowing through sandpaper.

"Isn't there, uh, like an oxygen tank and mask or anything like that in there?" May asks. "Something to ease his breathing up a little. I assume _no one_ in here has any medical training?"

"No ma'am, just what little we got in the army to get us by," Captain America replies regretfully. "And only what I've learned on the road. Or the run. Which isn't the level of expertise he needs." He turns to the pilots. "Is there anything in this container that would help with, uh, breathing? I don't see anything that looks like that in here."

One unbuckles and comes to the back, searching through the box. He pulls out a round black bag, and there's a thin, two-pronged hose at the end. He taps his nose and points at the small hose. "You stick this in his nose and there is, maybe, three hours, or four, in the bag." He looks over at Peter. "It is much harder off oxygen after you use it. I would wait as long as possible."

We hit a small buffer of turbulence, and a shudder runs through the jet. Peter squeezes my hand briefly, and then releases, jerking his elbow back.

"It's okay," murmurs May.

"No - no - it's…" Peter struggles to shift his heavy head and look at me. "Did I hurt your hand?"

"No, not at all," I say. "You can squeeze it as hard as you want."

"Can't… do that," he blows air through his teeth like he's trying to whistle. In, and out. In, and out. Concentrating on his breathing like it's a test he has to pass. _Failing grade._

I know he's in a lot of pain and we can't do anything about it… but how much can _we_ expect him to take? Six hours of this? Even if he's not bleeding out because the blade was left in, the human body can only take so much. He could be bleeding internally too. We just can't tell.

I wrap both hands around his, making a fist. He'd pull his hand away if he wasn't so weak right now. "Yes you can," I say calmly.

"No," he repeats. "I'd break... your hand… if I did…"

A jolt of recognition pounds in my chest. "Oh, right," I say, with a lightness I don't actually possess. "The… Spider-Man thing. You… you probably have super powers, don't you? Like… super strength."

"Y-yeah."

"I wish you had super healing," I mutter.

"I…" Peter winces at another tremble of turbulence, his teeth clenching and his head knocking back into the table. The small, wadded pillow softens the blow only a little.

"He does," May whispers. "But…"

"It's not working right now? Is that it?"

My words come across as sharp. I wish I wasn't like that, sometimes. That I could possess the tact and sarcasm of May without being cruel. She exudes warmth, and I never do. Ned radiates with kindness. I envy them both their inner light. I probably suck all the energy from the room. Maybe if I wasn't here, Peter would bounce back quicker.

"I'm sorry," I stutter. "That… that… wasn't, what I meant to sound like."

"You're right, though," Aunt May rests her hand on Peter's forehead, brushing her thumb back and forth across the gray skin. A cold sweat beads on his temple, dripping into his already-damp hair. His whole body looks wet, but chilled. A clammy sweat. That must be so uncomfortable.

I try to tuck the blanket around him a little more comfortably.

"Got something," Captain America comes back, tapping a syringe lightly in his hand. "The Wakandan equivalent of morphine." He pulls the tiny plastic capsule off, exposing a short but thick needle. "It's a drug they call _umbane._ Means lightning, I think."

"Electricity," corrects the pilot. He turns in his chair and looks towards us. There's a glint on his chest; a name tag. _Amobi._ "Because it works fast."

"Thank you," Captain America says.

"In the arm," says Amobi. He taps his inner arm with two fingers and nods at Captain America. I guess I should really try to think of him as Steve Rogers. He hasn't been on the American continent for months, as far as I know. He's not really Captain of anything, except maybe this jet.

"Vein, muscle?" Steve Rogers asks.

"Muscle," Amobi answers.

I make an honest effort to distract him. "Hey Peter," I say.

"Hm?" he replies, his focus sliding in and out.

"I read Casey's valedictorian speech. She wanted someone to help edit. D'you know what her focus was?"

"Oh, the places you'll go?" Peter asks sullenly.

"Even worse. Dr. Seuss _and_ Katniss Everdeen."

Steve jabs the needle into Peter's arm quickly, pushes the plunger down, and withdraws.

"Eey," Peter exclaims tiredly, his head heavily lolling off to the side again to try and glare at Steve. His Queens accent heavier for a moment, as if the injustice of getting an injection with no warning reminds him of a speeding taxi skirting over the crosswalk while he's still in it. "Has anyone told you," his voice is hoarse, smiling attempted, "you have terrible bedside manners?"

"I've heard it once or twice," Steve smiles to himself, disposing of the syringe into the box after capping the needle. "Tony is worse."

Peter's brows furrow. "I was… supposed to tell you something."

"You don't have to try and talk right now, sweetie," May reminds him.

"No… no… Mr. Stark was talking in code, right… and basically said I needed to run away to Wakanda… Loki was there… at the facility. But I took the infinity stone and ran…"

I feel the heat against my chest. So much for our Asgardian Topaz.

 _Infinity stone._ I wonder if he'd mentioned it before, or if I knew it all along. I don't feel surprised. I am resigned to the fact, as if someone asked for a weather report, that I currently have one of universe-destroying gemstones once gracing the knuckles of Thanos now tucked in _my bra_.

I want to say this is the weirdest thing that's ever happened to me - except that my best friend might die on Captain America's private jet on the way to a spaceport in Africa. That is weirder. Worse.

I grip Peter's hand a little tighter.

"I know Tony is in trouble," Steve lifts Peter's arm gently off the table, two fingers pressed to his inner wrist, his eye on the watch looped around his own. Checking his pulse. "A distress signal was dispelled from the complex. I couldn't raise him on his cell."

"We should go back and help him," Peter says, and I notice it's taking more effort for him to speak, but his sentences are more complete. Easier to understand. Like it still hurts to talk, but doesn't hurt to think.

"Are you out of your damn mind, Peter?" May's fuse burns out. "The most advance medical science in the _world_ is in Wakanda. And that's where we are going. End of st…" She cuts off the end of her sentence with a bitten lip. "I'm sorry," she says softly. "I didn't mean to snap at you. I'm so sorry."

"I know you're worried," Peter's voice drifts lazily into a deep, sleepy volume. "I'm worried t…" His eyes drift shut and does not continue with that thought.

"Someone will respond to the facility's automated distress call," Steve assures us. He needs to assure himself, I think. "Someone will. They have to."

He looks over towards Ned, gripping his seatbelt straps so hard it makes his knuckles way too pale. "How are you holding up, son? You look a little green."

Ned gulps. "Is… is there a bathroom on board, sir - Cap - Captain America, sir?"

"You can just call me Steve," he answers, a finger pointing at the back, close to where we dumped our bags inside the ramp. Where the length of a jet cinches together in storage and the entrance, there's two small alcoves just past the wings. A bathroom, and a tiny, single-sink kitchen behind a folding door.

I guess private jets usually have these sorts of things, but the Wakandan part makes everything unfamiliar. Everything is black, sleek, reflective. Fancy but not comfortable. Give me some brown leather seats and orange commercial carpet any day. I'm not a fancy girl.

"You'll have to unbuckle to go to the bathroom," I remind Ned as gently as I can.

"I know how to do that," he protests, not really listening. He shakily unbuckles himself and rushes for the rest room, pressing the door shut behind him.

"He just needs to be alone for awhile," I explain. "He gets motion sickness."

I both hate and love that I know this about him. Poor Ned… I shouldn't have snapped at him earlier. I should have tried to be comforting. He deserves it.

I never thanked him for trying to buy us breakfast.

My stomach gives a low growl, luckily too quiet for anyone to hear. I press a hand to my shirt.

"Peter's asleep," May announces. "Thank goodness… I hate seeing him like this. I hate, hate, hate it." She folds her hands and presses her forehead into the edge of the table, hard enough to create an angry red line across her skin. " _Padre Nostro, che sei nei cieli, Sia santificato il tuo nome...mi aiuti per favore. Mi aiuti per favore."_ She trails off and lifts her head.

"What is that?" I ask. "Italian?"

"Something my great grandmother used to pray," May replies. "Very Italian. _Very_ Catholic. She'd be rolling in her grave if she knew I quoted her." She curls her hand around Peter's, falling silent. Her focus unfocused and deathly pale.

"The _umbane_ must feel pretty good if he's comfortable enough to sleep," Steve observes. "Thank God." He checks his pulse a second time. "It's a little slower now."

"That's… good, right?" May asks.

"Slower pulse is relaxed right now," I assure her. "Faster is fear and stress. If it drops too low it's not good. If it feels more normal… that's good."

"She's right," Steve nods his approval towards me. "He can get through this. He can do it. Shuri is a great doctor, and has a great team. She'll get him back on his feet in no time."

"Shuri?" May asks.

"T'Challa's sister."

"A princess?" May's eyes widen. "That's… impressive. I mean. Good. Good."

I've read about Shuri. I think Peter said he met her once, she came to the Avengers facility while he was interning, and…

Oh, wait. That was probably a lie. He probably met her because he's Spider-Man. Not an intern. Interns don't get to meet famous princesses. Really gorgeous and accomplished and famous and genius princesses.

I'm half-heartedly jealous, in a inspired sort of way. I don't envy her accomplishments by wishing them away from her. I just want to accomplish the same sorts of things. Just… without a crown.

Are the college programs really all that great on Xandar? Or is my dream of a Harvard or MIT education obliterated with my leaving Earth?

Half of my brain tries to remind me that Peter had been lying to me about being Spider-Man for a long time, probably years. But I refuse to give in to that whining voice, clutching and conniving at the back of my memories. If he dies today… I don't want to have any of that. I only want to think about how good he's been. How lucky I was - AM - to have him as a friend.

So the other half of my brain distracts me with mourning the loss of the dreams I thought I had, displaced by May's generosity and my parent's insistence for me to get off planet. Wishing I were a princess instead, giving in to the trope.

 _Not me. No Harvard, no MIT. No Earth._

 _Maybe no Peter..._

Ned squeezes out of the bathroom door and comes over to stand by me. He tentatively puts a hand forward and touches Peter's shin. _Pat, pat._

"Can I do anything?" he asks. Kindness and desperation both clamoring for dominance in his voice.

May forces her eyes away from her nephew's face. "No, Ned," she answers. "There's nothing… nothing we can do right now. Thank you. Are you holding up okay?"

Ned shrugs. "I guess I'm hungry. But. Y'know. I'm sure we all are. That's normal."

It's sad how true it is that being a little hungry is sort of a normal thing.

Being invited to May and Peter's for dinner was the result of it being a good week in the rest of the country. Sometimes there are bad weeks. Food runs low. The school hasn't served food in the cafeteria since before _our_ freshman year.

I know sometimes when I was at my prickliest, my classmates assumed I was just hormonal. Usually it was because I hadn't eaten in a day, or longer.

Ned and Peter always shared what little they had with me.

"There's some rations in the unit in the back," Steve Rogers says, brightening. "Let me get something for you. All of you."

He speed-walks to the back and opens a small panel beneath the circular sink, clearly relieved at having something doable to accomplish. Captain America, everyone. He's saved the world a few times. Now he digs through the drawer of a private jet to find protein bars.

I guess I'm not the only one who feels mightily displaced.

…

 _May Parker_

…

 _2003_

"Up," Peter was always so insistent, clinging his chubby toddler arms around my leg and pressing a pair of drooling, slobbering lips to my kneecap. "Up. Up. Up. Annie-May."

He had been taught by his parents to say _Auntie May_ before they died. The letter T was still an insurmountable obstacle.

"Oof, you're getting _heavy,_ " I said, sliding my hands beneath his armpits and yanking him off the floor, letting him feel a swing of being airborne - of course, without letting him go - up into the air and then down with a _hmph_ into my arms. He squealed with delight and cackled like a tiny evil scientist.

A tiny evil scientist with… markings all over his face and arms.

"What do you have all over your face?" I asked.

He giggled and looked away.

"Peter!" I repeated. "Look at Auntie May! What's on your face?"

He wiggled his head from side to side, trying to avoid me seeing that his face was covered in cherry-red goop.

"Blooooood?" he drawled, like it was a question.

"Is that my lipstick?" I asked.

"No," he replied, sticking a finger in my cheekbone and poking sporadically. "No, no, I godda… I god blood…"

"Oh it's _blood,_ huh?" I asked. "Well if that's _blood,_ where's the injury, hm? Where's the cut? Because it smells like my lipstick. It looks like my lipstick." I kiss his cheek loudly. "It tastes like my lipstick!"

"Bloood," he squealed. "Playing hob-siddel."

"Oh, you're a doctor?" I asked.

He nodded. "Yeaaaah."

"Can you say _hospital?"_ I asked.

"Hob-siddel."

" _Hospital."_

"Hops." Peter cackled again, smearing a long, mauve line down my nose with his fingers. "Hops. Poodle." Then he exploded into chaotic giggles.

"Peter, did you get into my purse?" I asked.

"Nuh uh."

"Did you get into my purse?"

" _NUH UH."_

"Tell the truth, Peter."

Finally he nodded, his head too clumsy, a giant bowling ball on a doll's body knocking back and forth.

"Peter," I reminded him sternly, "We don't lie in this house. I say - _did you get into my purse,_ and you say - yes."

His chin trembled.

"Come on, Peter," I coaxed. "No lies. Remember? No-No Lying!"

"No-no lying," he repeated, looking as if the world was about to come crashing down.

There were still remnants and memories of what little he retained from his parents, Richard and Mary Parker. Ben and I were desperately trying to undo the damage of his separation anxiety from their deaths, but it's not easy. We never knew what would trigger a toddler-sized tantrum.

If only if it were for easy reasons - like _teething_. Needing a nap. Taking away a toy when it's abused and thrown into the fire escape.

But no, nothing easy. Our little Peter would lose his goddamn mind when he felt the grief of being orphaned and didn't know how to express it. And sometimes, scolding him - even as gently as I would - would suddenly make him afraid that if he's disappointed me, I'd disappear just like his mom did. And sometimes I forgot that.

"So messy!" I said with a laughing sigh. "So so messy!"

But it's too late, I told him _no no lying._ Now comes the fear of disappointment and disappearance. His lipstick-covered face twisted into a deep red that outmatched my _Cherry Orchard_ color that I saved in my purse for job interviews.

And the howls and screams that followed - unfathomably loud. Giant saltwater falls cascaded down his chubby cheeks and he buried his head into my shoulder, unleashing every ounce of child-sized anguish.

I knew he was getting lipstick on my shirt and I didn't care. I nuzzled in for the long haul, bouncing him lightly in my arms and beginning my trek up and down the short apartment hallway. Pacing back and forth, back and forth, from one room to another, gracing every corner of the apartment with his screams. Soothing him with nonsensical words of comfort and pats on his back.

I found a small portion of the wall between the sitting room and the hall decorated with lipstick drawings at shin-level. A big smiley face caught my eye. The letters B, O, and J... even though he couldn't spell yet. He liked noticing letters on signs, and Ben and I would explain the letters when we drove by. He also drew something that could be a frog, or maybe a bong. It's difficult to tell with kids.

Maybe he'd have a future in graffiti art and never stop drawing on walls. The thought was stressful.

Ben got home from work just as Peter's cries died down into sniffling, sleepy hiccoughs.

"Oh, wow," he exclaimed, eyes drawn to the fallen purse on the floor, the uncapped lipstick, the wall-art, and my tired face. "Long day?" he asked.

"You have no idea," I sighed. "You?"

"Not as long as yours, apparently." He leaned down and retrieved my purse from the floor, returning it to the dinette table that Peter had managed to pull it off of. "Is he awake?"

"Not for much longer," I answered. "Come say hi."

"Hey, little buddy," Ben brushed Peter's curly hair back from his hot face, looked at his teary eyes, and my tired ones. "How long have we been doing the walk of shame?" he asked, careful not to laugh too hard at me.

I glanced at the wall clock. "About thirty minutes."

"Need a break?"

Peter's tiny curled head was heavy by now under my ear, turning his face so that his nose and mouth crammed into my collarbone. It's a wonder if he can even breathe in there, his body finally relaxed into an overheated, tiny plush pillow of baby-fat and legs getting longer and longer every day.

I shook my head. "It's okay. I think we're on the tail end of it now. He'll want more snuggles after he's had some dinner."

Ben leaned around Peter's cuddles and kissed me soundly three times against my lips, stepping back with a cherry smudge on his own nose. "So what was the occasion this time?" he asked, nodding his head towards the smiley face caked into the wallpaper. "Did he blame his Captain America G.I. Joe for this one too?"

"Oh, no," I explained, laughing lightly. "This was supposed to look like blood."

Ben made a _yeesh!_ expression and looked at the wall.

"Hm," he said. "He spelled Redrum wrong."

I laughed loudly. "He was playing _hobsiddel."_

"Oh, good," Ben sighed with relief. "Maybe he'll grow up to be a doctor someday and we can tell this anecdote at his grad party when he gets his PhD."

" _You_ can tell the anecdote. I will be catching up on twenty-one years of sleep."

He laughed and walked into the kitchen. Without asking, he rummaged through the freezer to find a pair of TV dinners, popping one into the microwave. Then he began to pull the fixings for making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for Peter, preemptively cutting off the crusts and cutting into small squares.

 _Spoiled,_ I thought, gripping my new child in my arms with protective, frightened possessiveness. _How lucky this tiny human is to be raised by an uncle like this._

He will never be in want with someone like Benjamin Parker around. And neither would I. I felt an overwhelming sense of gratitude for the man I married, and that his brother entrusted us to indicate us as guardians of his child should something - the unthinkable - happen. Which did happen. Only two years ago - but it felt like yesterday.

Ben slapped a measure of jelly onto the bread, and smiled impishly at me.

I smiled back at my husband, my forever partner.

…

 _Present_

...

The next few hours pass in a horrifying blur.

Peter, at times, slightly awake and coherent. Trying to ask if we've heard anything from Tony Stark. Exhausted by his efforts to converse, and encouraged by both mine and Steve's assurances that he needs to lie still and rest, he passes out again.

Ned and Michelle finally fall asleep against the wall, Ned's head smooshed against her shoulder when he slides sideways.

When Amobi and his co-pilot, Yonas, tell us that we have about three hours left, Steve and I decided to put Peter on the small oxygen device. I wish we hadn't had to wait so long, but we knew we'd only have a few hours of use, after all.

I can't help but see my nephew as much younger than he is, lying helpless and pale and bloodied. Happier memories clamor for attention in my head, when he was small enough to be carried, and when the worst injury he could possibly have was skinned knee. Ben used to call him _Peter Bonker._ He used to _bonk_ his head a lot, running into things and not paying attention.

We used to laugh and cheer a hearty " _YAY, GOOD JOB, PETER!"_ every time he accidentally slammed his head into a wall, a chair, a table. Perplexed by our praises, he would quickly switch from shrieking wails to a bubbling, confused grin.

I guess these habits never really go away. An alien blade is sticking out of his gut, and I whisper how proud I am, that he's going to be okay, that I love him, that he did the best he could. My logical side is telling me that I'm saying _goodbye._

I refuse. _I'm not losing you today._

I bite my lip uncomfortably when I realize I said this out loud. But Peter's delirious state now is in no way receptive of my words. His eyelids flutter, and sometimes it sounds like he's trying to speak, liquid murmurs in his mouth and an attempt to keep his eyes open and focused. Sometimes he says _May_ , with a lift at the end, making my name a question. I think he just wants to know I'm here.

In case he dies, he doesn't want to be alone.

When we finally begin our descent, the coast of Africa a dark smudge under a late afternoon sky, shrouded in beautiful rain clouds that are grayer - and cleaner - than the clouds in New York. They are five hours ahead of us, and we've crossed a timezone, but I think we've only lost an hour. Or maybe we gained an hour? We traveled for six hours, Peter sleeping fitfully, the rest of us keeping careful watch.

The only thing that matters is we're here and Peter is still alive.

I've never been more exhausted by my fear, but that second wind kicks in.

My heart pounds so hard, my adrenaline begs for my attention, but I stay focused on Peter. Ned and MJ report the landscape from the windows; beautiful dessert, more vibrant than anything they've seen, full of red canyons cutting between green hills, vibrant with tall trees baked in good weather - maybe the _only_ good weather still on the planet. Farms that are still in good working condition. The spotted patchwork of cities. When we fly over them, Yonas turns on invisible panels beneath the jet. I am not sure why.

Then we're flying over a significant portion of the central countries of Africa, where Wakanda is shrouded in forests teeming still with life - and even greenery. Wakandan resources have been shared with border counties during the world's crisis.

I envy their neighbors.

The landing is bumpy, and for the first time, the light through the windows is _clean._ Light untouched by the unknown alien substance killing the rest of the world off slowly. I already half-heartedly heard a conversation between Steve and ground control about being prepared for a medical emergency… or maybe it's not ground control. Maybe airports work differently in Wakanda. Maybe it was a phone call directly to the King. I wouldn't know.

I don't know about a lot here, and that frightens me too. I never imagined a world where I couldn't wind Peter up like the energizer bunny, asking him to explain something to me so that he would unleash into an excited geek-out and explain everything I needed to know in less than five minutes.

The jet taxis to a halt.

"Welcome to _Ukuwela_ ," says Amobi. "The _crossing."_

"Thank you," I try to say, but no sound comes out. My voice squeaks hoarsely, the sleep deprivation prevalent.

"Good luck," says Yonas. " _Phila."_

Ned and MJ are collecting their bags, adding Peter's to their haul. I take my suitcase, and put the satchel over my shoulder. I hear the crinkle of paper inside.

I already have one death certificate. I don't want any more. I will carry Ben with me; always. Peter deserves more than what Ben and I went through. Peter will _not_ be a small name on filigreed paper in my pocket. Ever. Not while I'm alive.

I squeeze his hand again. _This isn't the end of my child. He's going to get through this. He will. He has to._

The ramp drops. The Princess Shuri and her team are waiting.

...

* * *

...

* * *

 **TWO TOTALLY MASSIVE AND IMPORTANT AUTHOR ANNOUNCEMENTS**

* * *

Announcement #1: I've begun developing the plot of AVENGE THE DEPARTED 2. I can't imagine when, but it's going to happen someday. I won't begin writing it till after this story, I'm entirely committed, so don't you worry. I wrote a very brief paragraph out and a few pages of notes to send to my beta Crystal (QueenofCrystallopia) and they are CMFU approved! :)

Announcement #2: Even though I marked it as "complete", I have unmarked it as I believe I will write an epilogue chapter for "Where They Go" once I see Avengers: Endgame. I get to see it early (Thursday) and I hope to have a short epilogue tying my ending in to the real resurrection in the film. IF I can. I still have no idea how they're going to work their magic, so it's possible my ending won't fit with theirs at all! But we'll see.

* * *

 **Reviewer Personal Replies (I'm seriously so blessed by how many of you commented)**

* * *

Black' Victor Cachat - I read your first chapter and left you a review! It was AWESOME, definitely impressive and creative. Thank you so much for continuing to review my work as well. I can only hope the children of Thanos are half as scary as the black riders! And yeah, Thanos definitely... "died" ;) and yes his secret cover is totally blown haha - at least to anyone on the ark! who knows who they will tell! Again thank you so much for reading and participating. Many thanks! Love your reviews!

GalaxyNifflers - thank you so much! This one was definitely slower-paced, but, y'know, the book has like 2 weeks of camping between Frodo getting stabbed and Rivendell... so I wanted to figure out something a lil' different ;) Thank you for your review!

Sakura-Fiction - HAHA your review made me laugh out loud. This chapter was definitely for you then. ;) thank you for commenting and reading as always. You're amazing

EleanorGardner - I love your reviews and how energetic they are lol, it literally gives me so much inspiration when my readers start using capslock lol. Thank you so much for always writing such thoughtful and fangirly comments! You are AWESOME! Also to answer your question; currently I am not posting my current stories on Wattpad. My wattpad actually needs a total revamp, I have a lot of OLD stuff on there. I need to redo it. I don't even remember what my user-name is. As SOON as I find it, I'll pm you so you can take a look at it and offer any tips or advice. I don't think I've ever been good at wattpadding. LOL. Thanks again as always ;)

LoonyLovegood1981 - MJ is a badass, isn't she? I just want to be her! She's SO cool. Thank you so much for your review! You're awesome!

Caver Floyd - ah yes, they'll definitely have more of a conversation about it soon. As well as seeing Black Panther! I thought it made more sense for T'Challa to remain on his throne and for Steve to come and meet them halfway, since he realized they were coming. I'm excited to write a few lil' reunion scenes! Thank you so much for reviewing, I truly appreciate it.

curry-llama - Are you familiar with the movie "Mean Girls"? Because your review totally reminded me of the line "We should totally just stab Caesar!" XD If that doesn't ring a bell, nevermind. Anyway. Thank you as always for your awesome reviews :) Hugs!

lone ranger22 - Thank you for reading and reviewing! I am not entirely sure what your question is tho? Are you asking what Spider-Man's super powers are?

LeDbrite - LOL that's so funny! Ironically I just posted a new chapter of Sakaar and Away today as well. By the time you are reading this you'll probably see two updates from me just a few hours apart. I REALLY appreciate you're reading both fics! It means the world to me! The "Flight to the Ford" scene definitely had to be condensed to a 6 hour flight, which even then is a science-fiction futuristic version since a usual flight would take more than twice that long XD I had to play around with mechanics a little to make it work. And Captain America is sometimes Aragorn, sometimes Gandalf, sometimes his own self :) One of the nice things about the interpretation of LOTR in a MCU-adventure setting is getting to play with personalities and shift people around. Like sometimes Peter's "Sam" will be May, Ned, or MJ, or sometimes all three. I love the freedom I get to have in the fan fiction world! Squeee! (Also, the bridal shower went REALLY well. Thank you SO much for your well wishes. That is just too sweet!)

cargumentluv - LOL I love your fangirling. Thank you so much for reviewing, always good to have ya back. Shuri is gonna jump right in and save our boy's life! Don't you worry! I'm not gonna have quite as much... killing... in this one as I did in ATD. Maybe not even in the sequel, haha.


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